


Urgent Care

by Jo (jmathieson)



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Action & Romance, Alternate Universe - Medical, BAMF Clint Barton, Blood and Gore, Deaf Clint Barton, Detailed descriptions of medical procedures, Drunk Sex, Getting Together, M/M, Past Clint Barton/Bobbi Morse (mentioned), Past Phil Coulson/Grant Ward (mentioned), Safer Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-30
Updated: 2014-12-31
Packaged: 2018-03-04 09:44:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 45,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3063173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jmathieson/pseuds/Jo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When a gorgeous young paramedic named Clint Barton walks into Dr. Phil Coulson's ER, both of their lives get a lot more complicated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is sort of an MCU/ER crossover (or more accurately MCU/St. Elsewhere, for those of you old enough to remember that show). There are lots of detailed descriptions of medical procedures, but nothing overtly gross. I had an actual NYC paramedic as a technical consultant on this story, so most of the details should be accurate. If I've made mistakes, call it artistic license.

The first time Clint Barton saw Dr. Phil Coulson he was covered in blood and trying not to scream.

The blood wasn’t his own. Most of it seemed to belong to the drunk with the gushing head wound who was refusing to sit still on the gurney so that Dr. Coulson could shine a light into his eyes to check for concussion symptoms. Clint was leaning against a wall in the ER, waiting for the okay to wheel his gurney back to his ambulance. The commotion in the nearest cubical caught his attention, and he glanced over to assess the situation, making sure the doctor had things under control and didn’t need his help. It was a reflex Clint had developed soon after completing his paramedic training, and now whenever he was in a crowd or a room full of people, he couldn’t help but be on the alert for trouble. The counselor that veteran’s affairs had assigned him when he got back from Iraq would probably say he had an over-developed sense of responsibility, but the truth was that Clint just liked helping people.

His days in the military were behind him, however, and now his battlefield was one of the poorest parts of the city. He’d seen more blood in the past five years as a paramedic than he had in three full tours in the Gulf, and plenty more besides. The patient with the scalp laceration was typical for a Thursday night; many of the blue-collar employers in the area handed out paychecks on Thursdays. 

Clint watched as the drunk wore on what was obviously the very last of Dr. Coulson’s patience. His voice, as he asked the man yet again to sit still, was getting louder and his tone more brittle.

“Sir, I’m trying to help you, but I can’t do that unless you sit still for a minute.”

“I don’ need to be here. I’ma fine. I can walk home. I won’ drive, I promise.”

“Sir, you have what could be a serious head wound. I need to check it for you. Please. Sit. Still.”

Clint unglued himself from the wall and glanced around for his shift partner, who had headed to the cafeteria for food as soon as they’d finished their patient hand-off. Not seeing her anywhere, he strolled over to where Dr. Coulson was tiredly saying, again, “Sir, please. Sit still.”

“It’s okay, buddy. We won’t call your wife if you don’t want us to. She doesn’t need to know,” Clint said from behind the doctor.

The drunk’s eyes went wide, and Dr. Coulson jumped at the opportunity to shine his pencil flashlight into one, then the other, to check for pupil response.

“Ish jus’ that she thinks I’m working late. If she knows I was at de Waterfront, she’ll have my hide. Is it gonna need stitches?”

“No, just a few butterfly closures. It’s not very deep,” said Dr. Coulson who was swabbing blood away from the wound with a square of gauze.

“Bled like a motherfucker. I slipped in puddle of shalsa and hit my head on de corner of de jukebox.”

“Well,” said Clint from over Coulson’s shoulder, “the doc here will have you fixed up in no time. You can tell your wife that you slipped at work and the first-aider fixed you up.”

“Yeah, yeah. Good idea, thanks man.”

“Hey, Barton, quit socializing. We’re cleared to roll!” Clint saw Nat standing at the nurse’s station with a styrofoam clamshell container in her hand.

“Coming,” Clint called, and turned to say something to Dr. Coulson, who was applying butterfly bandages to the drunk’s scalp wound.

“Look out, she’s got a knife!” someone screamed from behind him.

Clint spun around to see a tall, heavy-set woman with long stringy hair and a murderous expression on her face launch herself towards Dr. Coulson’s back, one arm raised. 

Clint didn’t stop to think, he just threw himself at the woman, one hand going to the raised wrist, gripping it tightly, and the other trying for a grappling hold. She was strong, and taller than him, so the knife came down inches from Coulson’s left shoulder. Clint stamped hard on her instep and tried to get his hip into her midsection for a judo throw. She squirmed and screeched and fought. He held on as best he could, trying to keep her knife hand under control as she beat on his back with a fist and screamed in his ear. Clint saw Nat and a security guard rushing to help, and they each grabbed one of her arms. Clint dug his fingernails into the woman's wrist to get her to drop the knife, and grabbed it as her hand unclenched. 

“I’ve got the knife,” he said loudly into the general fray.

“Get some restraints!” an orderly yelled. 

Nat was helping to wrestle the woman down onto a gurney. With four of them holding her down, a nurse and another orderly managed to strap the ranting, screeching woman to the bed.

“Bad trip,” said the head nurse, who had a syringe in a tray and was preparing to administer a sedative.

"Here, I'll take that," Nat said gesturing for the knife. Clint handed it over and then wiped his hand across his temple which was itching. It came away red. 

“Yes, that’s yours,” said Nat, his shift partner. “Looks like it’ll need a couple of stitches, too. What the hell do you think you were doing, taking her on like that?”

“Saving my life,” said a voice behind them. Clint and Nat turned to look at Dr. Coulson. 

“It wasn’t that big a knife, she probably would’ve just punctured one of your lungs. That is if it didn’t bounce off your scapula on the way in,” Clint said with a wide grin. 

“Thank you, all the same. I very much appreciate not being punctured by a patient. I’m Phil Coulson.” Dr. Coulson stuck out his hand to shake.

“Clint Barton,” Clint said, shaking his hand. “And this is my shift partner, Natasha Romanov. I haven’t seen you here before, are you new?”

“Started a few days ago. It’s nice to meet you both. If this is your usual turf, I expect we’ll be seeing a lot of each other. Look, I’d be happy to stitch that up for you, if you like. It’s the least I can do.” Dr. Coulson gestured at the side of Clint’s head, which was starting to ache.

“Thanks, I don’t want him bleeding all over our bus. And here, you probably want this,” Nat handed Clint one of his hearing aids. He hadn’t noticed it fall out during the fight. 

“Thanks Nat. Shit, hope it’s not broken. I’ve gone through two of these in the last 18 months. Veteran’s Affairs is gonna cut me off.”

“So get workman’s comp to pay for them, they’re good for it,” Nat said.

“Too much paperwork,” grumbled Clint. 

“Yeah, any paperwork is too much for you. Get the good doctor here to patch you up. I’ll radio in from the bus and let dispatch know that we’re going to be unavailable for a bit. And eat my lunch in peace where there aren’t crazy people waving knives around.” Nat gestured with her food container.

“Thanks, Nat.” Clint grabbed an antiseptic wipe from a tray and tore the packet open with his teeth, then used the little gauze square to thoroughly wipe his hearing aid before putting it back in his ear. “I got a couple of nasty ear infections when I first started wearing these babies,” he explained to Dr. Coulson, who was stripping off the bloody gloves he’d been wearing to examine his previous patient (who seemed to have disappeared during the fight), and making liberal use of a bottle of hand-sanitizer before putting on a fresh set, “so I’m really careful now if they hit the floor, especially in a hospital.”

“I can see that. Here,” Dr. Coulson said, tearing open a square of gauze and pressing it gently to the side of Clint’s head. “You’re still bleeding. Put some pressure on that.”

“Sure thing, Doc, thanks.”

“Phil. Please, call me Phil. After all, you did just - ” 

“Don’t be going on with the ‘I saved your life’ thing, please, you’re gonna make me blush.” Far from blushing, Clint was wearing a cocky grin.

“I get the idea you don’t actually blush very easily,” Phil said as he prepped a suture kit. 

Clint gave him a sidelong glance at that, and started to pay a lot more attention to the doctor’s looks and demeanor. He probably wasn’t flirting. Probably. Not that Clint would mind if he was. The doc… Phil, Clint corrected, was good looking. A little older, and with a bit of a receding hairline, but he had a friendly, open face, a warm smile, and some very cute crinkly lines at the corners of his eyes when he smiled. And his hands… Clint looked down at the sure, steady fingers that were checking instruments and then drawing local anesthetic from a vial into a syringe. Nice hands. Very nice hands.

“Do you have any allergies?” Phil asked, breaking into Clint’s thoughts.

“Nope. Not to any drugs, that is. You don’t want to hear about what pistachios do to my digestion.”

“Good. Let me see that laceration?” 

Clint obligingly took the gauze away from his temple, and Phil stepped in close to examine the wound. Clint tried not to be obvious about how he was taking a sniff of Phil’s aftershave. It was understated, with just a hint of musk, but very masculine. Clint liked it.

“Just a simple slice. Three stitches should do it. I’m going to inject the local anesthetic now; you’ll feel a slight pinch.” 

“Yeah, I’ve had stitches before. A few times, actually. It’s a rough business being a paramedic in this part of town.” Clint kept his head perfectly still as he talked, not wanting to make Phil's job any more difficult.

“Yes,” Phil said as he depressed the plunger on the syringe. “I’m learning that rather quickly. Now we just need to give that a couple of minutes to take effect.” He put the syringe down in a tray, clasped his gloved hands together, and smiled widely at Clint. “You mentioned that you get your hearing aids from the VA, so I’m going to assume you learned how to disarm knife-wielding attackers in the military?”

“Yeah, I was an infantry grunt until about five years ago. Then an anti-tank round went off next to me and blew out my left eardrum. Fucked up the right one pretty bad, too, not to mention filling my left side with shrapnel, so I got a medical discharge. Seeing as how it was that or switch to an administrative position, and as you heard, I’m not too of fond of paperwork, so…”

“So you exchanged one war zone for another.” Phil smiled, and Clint grinned back at him.

“Yeah, I guess you could say that. Get shot at less often here, though, which is good. Get barfed on more, though.” Clint grimaced.

“Tell me about it.” Phil rolled his eyes and they shared a smile. “Can you feel that?” Phil lightly poked the skin near Clint’s scalp wound.

“Nope, you’re good to go, Doc. Sorry, Phil.”

“Whichever makes you more comfortable,” Phil said with a twinkle in his eyes, and Clint was pretty sure that Phil was actually flirting with him now, mildly, anyway. He considered and discarded three replies for being too forward or simply outrageous, as Phil picked up a pre-threaded suture needle and deftly started to put a stitch in Clint’s scalp. “Thank you, by the way, for your help earlier,” Phil said. “Before the attempted stabbing, I mean, with the drunk.”

“Oh, that. You’re welcome. I just noticed how he kept fidgeting with his wedding ring and guessed that that's why he was trying so hard to get out of here.”

“You’re very observant.”

“Yeah, the guys in my unit used to call me Hawkeye, as a joke, or a kind of a nickname, I guess. I see things. You’ll start to pick up on that sort of thing once you’ve been here a while, though, don’t worry.” Clint was glad to have something to chat about to distract him from how close Phil was standing. He needed to, of course, to stitch the wound, but Clint could feel the warmth of his body and it was making his thoughts head in directions that were completely inappropriate for the situation. He told his libido to cool it.

“Yes, I’ll have to re-train my instincts for this environment,” Phil murmured as he concentrated on putting in the next stitch.

“Isn’t it a little unusual to start working in the ER, um, later in your career? Where’d you work before this, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“Oh, I’ve worked in an ER before, but it’s been a while. I spent the last 9 months doing a mission with Doctors Without Borders in Syria.”

“Shit!” Clint said with admiration in his voice. “So you’ve also swapped one war zone for another.”

“Well, we weren’t in an actual war zone. They’re really good at making sure we’re only working in places that are reasonably safe from ongoing hostilities. Though I have to admit, it got a little hairy a couple of times. We would get casualties coming in from a battle that was going on 100 kilometers away, but it felt closer than that, you know?” 

“Oh yeah, I know exactly what you mean. Wow, that takes some real dedication, to drop everything and go halfway around the world to work for free.”

“Not quite free; we got paid about a thousand dollars a month,” Phil explained as he put another stitch in Clint’s head and tied it off.

“That’s like, a third of what I make as a paramedic.”

“Well, it’s a token. So you can keep paying the rent on your apartment while you’re away, that sort of thing.” 

“Right, that makes sense. Because otherwise you’d have to like, save up nine month’s rent before you went, and that’d be a bitch.”

“Exactly. So I’ve been dealing mostly with shrapnel wounds and sepsis for the past nine months. I have to get used to drunks and belly aches and diabetics again.” Clint heard the ‘snick’ as Phil clipped the ends of the sutures and then dropped the needle into the tray. “At least I’ve kept in practice with my stitching. This should heal nice and clean, the scar will hardly be visible with your hair.” As Phil spoke he brushed a lock of Clint’s hair back and Clint fought not to shiver at the touch. It had been a while since he’d had a lover and he missed being touched. Phil took one last look at his handiwork and stepped back.

“Hell, I’m covered in scars already. Another little scratch is hardly gonna make any difference.” Clint turned his head and brushed his hair back to give Phil a better look at the left side of his face. There was a scattering of white marks stretching from his jaw to his ear, which had a pronounced dent in the shell, as well as sporting a small in-ear hearing aid. “And that’s nothing compared to my arm and side.” Clint was usually self-conscious about his scars and the damage to his left ear, which is why he’d started wearing his hair longer. But Phil was a doctor, and not likely to be squeamish or overly inquisitive about his injuries. Besides, he wouldn’t mind getting more familiar with Dr. Coulson, so he shouldn’t be shy about showing his skin, scars and all.

“Yes, I’ve seen what an anti-tank round does to a body. You were lucky,” Phil said as he stripped off his gloves and dropped them in a hazmat disposal bag.

“Still am,” Clint said, turning his biggest, brightest smile on Phil, who blushed just a tiny bit. ‘Bingo,’ thought Clint. ‘He’s interested. Awesome.’

“I’d say I’m the lucky one. Lucky you happened to be here when someone tried to put a knife in my back.” Phil was looking at him steadily, and Clint’s instinct was to ask him out there and then, but he stopped himself. Jumping in headfirst was his usual way of doing things, but it had gotten him into trouble more than once, and after his most recent disaster of a relationship, he’d sworn to himself (and Nat) that he was going to take things more slowly from now on.

So what he said was, “Can you get a few minutes’ break? I’m dying for a cup of coffee and a danish, and you look like you could use one too.”

“I’d love to, I really would, but…” Phil trailed off and looked around the bustling Emergency Room.

“You’ve already spent more time with me than you should have. That’s okay, I get it,” Clint said quickly, hopping off the bed. “Thanks for stitching me up.” Clint had never dealt with rejection well, even when it wasn’t really even rejection.

“Look, maybe next time you’re here, it’ll be quieter. Then we could get a cup of coffee together.” Phil seemed sincere, so Clint loosened up again, his expression softening.

“I’d like that.”

“Me, too. Next time.” Dr. Coulson’s smile was soft.

“Yeah, okay.”

“And thanks again, for saving my life,” Phil said with a grin as he stuck out his hand to shake. 

Clint grinned back and took the outstretched hand. It was firm and warm and Clint gave a little squeeze before letting go. “Next time,” he said, flirting mildly, but openly. Phil blushed a little again, and Clint grinned to himself as he sauntered away.

He was about to head out to the parking area where Nat was waiting in the ambulance, but he did really want that coffee and something to eat, so he made a detour by the cafeteria. While he was standing in line, he had an idea. He bought two coffees and two pastries, slipping sugar packets and a couple of creamers into the second foam clamshell. He fished a pen out of his uniform pocket, and carefully wrote ‘Dr. Phil Coulson’ across the top of the styrofoam, and ‘Until next time.’ across the bottom, signing it simply with a curly letter ‘C’. He dropped the container, with the paper coffee cup perched on top, off at the Emergency Department’s nurse’s station.

“When Dr. Coulson gets a break, make sure he gets this, will you?” he said with his most charming smile.

“Sure Clint. Nicely done, earlier, by the way,” said Maria, the Head Nurse, looking up from her computer. “We should get the hospital to give you a medal.”

“Already got a bunch, thanks!” Clint said, and headed for the doors.

~~~~~~

Five days later Clint and Nat wheeled a patient into St. Mary’s Emergency Department on a quiet Wednesday afternoon.

“Hello Ivy, how are you doing today?” asked the triage nurse with a kind smile. Ivy was one of their regulars.

“Not too good, missy, not too good.”

“Well we’ll see what we can do about that,” the nurse said to the elderly patient, and, “I’ll take it from here, thanks guys,” to Clint and Nat.

“I need the restroom and to make a phone call, in that order. See you back at the bus in fifteen?”

“Sounds good,” Clint said, looking around the ER.

“Looking for Phil?” Nat teased, elbowing him in the ribs.

“So what if I am? We have a coffee date. Whenever he’s, you know, available.” Clint was absolutely not blushing.

“Just take this one slow, okay Clint? I still haven’t worked off all the Häagen-Dazs we ate after you broke up with Bobbi.”

“Slow as molasses on a glacier, I promise,” said Clint raising his hand as if he were taking an oath. 

“I’ll believe that when I see it.” Nat rolled her eyes at him and headed in the direction of the washrooms.

Clint didn’t see Phil around the ER. There were a couple of other doctors and nurses he recognized, and he stood there hemming and hawing, wondering who was the best person to ask if Dr. Coulson was working today. A tap on his left shoulder startled him and he had dropped halfway into a defensive crouch before he recognized Phil himself. Who was standing with his hands out in a placating gesture.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.” 

“No, it’s okay, I just…” It was Clint’s turn to blush. “The battlefield instincts take a while to fade, especially working in this part of town.”

“Maybe you should try keep them. You can’t deny they’ve been useful. How’s your head?” Phil asked, glancing towards the scalp laceration.

Clint pushed back his shaggy hair so that Phil could see the one remaining bit of stitching that hadn’t dissolved and fallen out yet. “That’ll probably go the next time I wash my hair,” he said, “It’s fine. You do nice work.”

“Thanks,” Phil said, and then seemed to be at a loss for anything else to say.

“Um, so about that coffee…” Clint started, looking around at the mostly empty ER. 

Phil followed his gaze and then grinned and nodded. 

“Yes, it’s pretty quiet this afternoon. I can spare ten minutes for a coffee break.

“Great!” said Clint, and then realized he probably sounded way too enthusiastic. “I mean, uh, that’d be nice.”

“Let me just tell Maria that I’ll be in the cafeteria so she can page me if something serious comes in.”

That accomplished, they headed for the hospital cafeteria. It was small and pokey and smelled unfortunately of tuna casserole. In his five years as a paramedic, Clint had become intimately familiar with the cafeterias of all the hospitals they dropped patients at. Some of the big shiny modern ones had what amounted to the kind of food court you’d find in any mall, and that always freaked him out a little. It was nice, of course, to be able to get a Starbucks latte or a slice of Domino's pizza when they were on break, but there was something about these older, dingier hospital cafeterias that reminded him of high school in the Midwest. Not quite poverty, but making do… he felt more comfortable in that environment, not to mention less worried he was going to embarrass himself by burping too loud. 

“So,” Clint said, fishing around for some way to start a conversation, “how are you settling in? Getting used to the belly aches again?”

Phil laughed. “Yes, though we had a multi-car pile-up yesterday, just to keep me on my toes. The really bad cases went over to UG, of course, but we got a patient with a badly broken ankle and face full of safety glass which took me most of the afternoon to clean up.”

Clint nodded. St. Mary’s was a smaller community hospital. Though its ER certainly saw it’s share of serious injuries, they transported cases that needed a full-fledged trauma center across town to the bigger, newer, better equipped hospitals like the University General. That was one of the ones with a Starbucks in the food court. Clint watched as Phil stirred two packets of sugar into his coffee and chose a chocolate brownie from the selection of deserts in a glass case. 

‘Sweet tooth,’ he thought. ’Need to remember that.’ He grabbed two creamers for his own coffee and a slice of cherry pie. The silence as they sat down to eat wasn’t awkward yet, but it was going to be in about fifteen seconds. Was it his imagination, or did Phil seem stiffer, less comfortable with him than he had the other day? Maybe because then the doctor had been on more familiar territory, stitching him up, confident in their roles. Maybe he should ask about something work-related, but he couldn’t think of anything. 

“So what’s it like being back home after the Middle East? Anything you miss?” Clint asked instead, figuring it wasn’t too personal a question, even if it was probably one that Phil had answered a dozen times already, and was getting sick of. Besides, it was something they had in common.

“The people,” Phil answered without hesitation. “The other MSF workers, the locals who were working with us, and the other international volunteers. It was like working at the United Nations, conversations going in three languages at once, people sharing food and news from home, telling each other about their friends and family, it was… really nice.” 

Clint got the impression that maybe Phil was a little lonely now that he was back. He was starting all over again with new colleagues, at a new workplace, and they all had families, friends, lives. Clint had felt some of that when he’d been discharged from the Army, except it was different for him because he didn’t have a home to go back to. 

”And the kids who hung around the clinic,” Phil was saying “They wanted to practice their English, or watch us work - they all claimed to want to be doctors when they grew up, of course, but it was wonderful, having them around, seeing them playing soccer in the courtyard and hearing them laugh while you were stitching up yet another bullet wound. It… it felt like a family, sometimes. I miss them all.” 

“Yeah, I can see that,” Clint said, remembering what it was like to miss the guys from his unit after he was discharged. At least he’d been able to keep in touch with many of them, for a while anyway. And there were a few he still saw every so often.

“And the food was great. I’m not much of a cook, so going back to frozen TV dinners after nine months of being served the most fantastic shawarma almost every day. And the baklava. One of the cooks found out how much I liked it and made sure there was a piece on my plate at every meal. I swear, if I hadn’t been working so hard I would have put on ten pounds.” Phil laughed, his eyes lighting up at the memory, and Clint laughed with him. “I did miss chocolate, though,” he said, taking a bite of his brownie.

“Just a bit of a sweet tooth, huh?” Clint said with a teasing grin.

“Just a bit,” Phil agreed, his eyes twinkling.

Clint wanted to make a suggestive remark, or a pass, or at least offer to take Phil to his favorite shawarma place, but ‘molasses on a glacier’ he reminded himself. ‘Besides, he’s not going anywhere. You’ll get to see him often.’ So he said, “You’d get along with my partner, Nat. She thinks you can fix all of life’s problems with ice cream.” He grinned. “Or vodka,” he added after a pause and got the chuckle he’d been after. Clint really liked seeing the little crinkles appear at the corners of Phil’s eyes when he smiled or laughed.

“She may have something-” Phil said, but was interrupted by his beeper. He took it off his hip and looked at it. “Car crash, sorry, gotta run.”

“No problem, Nat’ll be wondering where I got to. See you around, I hope?” Clint gave Phil his brightest smile, flirting again just a tiny little bit.

“Sure thing,” Phil said, and hurried off in the direction of the ER.

~~~~~

“Pull over, there.” Clint said suddenly, and Nat braked evenly to slow the ambulance down.

“Where, and why?” she asked.

“There,” Clint said, pointing at a storefront that advertized ‘Halal Shawarma.’ “There’s space in front of that fire hydrant.”

“Clint,” Nat’s voice held a warning. 

“I’ll be two minutes, tops, I promise.”

“How can you be hungry? You had two burgers for lunch less than an hour ago.”

“This is dessert!” Clint said, “This place make the absolute best authentic baklava in the city. I’ll get you some, too.”

Nat rolled her eyes but pulled the ambulance into the space Clint was pointing to.

“Thanks. Be right back!” True to his word, Clint was back within a couple of minutes, carefully balancing a stack of three small containers.

“Here’s yours, as promised,” he said handing one to Nat. She checked her mirrors to make sure there weren’t any fire trucks headed their way, turned the volume on the radio up a notch, and opened the container Clint had given her. She ate quietly, but with appreciation.

“What did I tell you? Best in the city,” Clint said, sucking the last of the honey off the ball of his thumb.

“Not bad. Did you get napkins?” 

Clint rolled his eyes but dug into the pocket of his uniform cargo pants and handed Nat a wad of paper napkins. Then he picked up the third container and fished out a pen.

“Ask him out already, Clint,” Nat said once she’d wiped her mouth and put the napkins and both their empty boxes in the small trash bag between the seats.

“You were the one who told me to take it slow.” Clint let a bit of a whine creep into his voice. He’d written ‘Dr. Phil Coulson’ carefully on the outside of the box, and then had opened it up to leave a message on the inside of the lid. Only he couldn’t decide what to write. Everything that came to mind was stupid or way too sappy.

“It’s been what, two weeks? And you’ve had coffee with him three times, and brought him dessert twice. You have to ask him out soon, otherwise it’s going to get weird.”

Clint sighed. “Hell, it’s probably already weird.” This was the problem with going slow. When he jumped right in without thinking, he didn’t have time to get nervous, or worried, or start doubting himself. This time, the longer he waited, the more worried he got. What if Phil said ‘no.’ What if he was reading the situation wrong, and Phil hadn’t been flirting with him, just being friendly. What if he wasn’t even gay? 

“What if he says no?” Clint mumbled.

Nat, who had been working with Clint for two years and knew him well, laughed at him. “He’s not going to say ‘no’. The two of you look at each other like a couple of shy high school kids. Grow a pair and ask him out.”

“Yeah, yeah. Okay.” Clint very briefly considered writing the question on the inside of the pastry box, but he thought of all the ways that could go horribly wrong, and besides, Nat’s comment about shy high-schoolers had struck home. No, he was going to man up and ask Phil out properly. The very next time they saw each other.


	2. Chapter 2

Phil licked the last of the honey off his fingers and sank back into the cushions of the break room sofa with a sigh. The baklava had been good. Delicious, in fact. Not quite the same as the kind Hanan, the camp cook in Idlib, had made, but wonderfully rich and sweet and very much appreciated none-the-less. Phil took a sip of his coffee and sighed. He wished he knew what to do about Clint.

The young man was cute and charming and funny and thoughtful and caring, and probably kind to small furry animals, too. He was perfect, and if Phil had been interested in a relationship, he would have already asked Clint out. The fact that Clint hadn’t made any move in that direction, despite the three coffee ‘dates’ and the gifts of desserts that he dropped off at the nurses station, was actually a little odd. But the problem was that Phil wasn’t looking for a relationship right now. And sooner or later, he was going to have to tell Clint that. Sooner would be better, of course, but Phil was a bit of a coward when it came to personal matters. The utter disaster of his last relationship had proven that beyond a shadow of a doubt. Phil’s stomach clenched just thinking about it, and he forced himself to breath deeply and evenly and take another sip of his coffee. The sweet bitterness was strangely soothing.

If he’d had more time, a few more months, then maybe he’d feel ready to start dating. But right now everything was still too raw. No matter how attractive Clint was (and he was very attractive), and no matter how wistfully Phil thought about him sometimes (like now, when he was licking honey off his fingers), he knew that the best thing to do was to gently, honestly tell Clint that he just wanted to be friends. For now, anyway. He finished his coffee and put the mug on the low table next to the sofa, making a mental note to wash it before heading back out to the ER. It was a quiet evening, though, and he thought he might get away with a short nap first. He tilted his head back, closed his eyes, and heard the whine of an ambulance siren arriving at the intake dock. Through the closed door of the break room, he heard a clatter and a shout and Maria calling his name. He jumped off the sofa and headed for the ER at a run. 

Phil skidded to a stop next to the gurney that Clint and Nat were wheeling into a curtain room. Clint had one earpiece of a stethoscope in his right ear (and his hearing aid presumably in his pocket) and the disk pressed to a very, very pregnant woman’s belly. Maria was already on the phone, calling for an obstetrician and a NICU cart and a fetal heart monitor.

“This is Cheryl Jackson. Her due date was yesterday. Her water broke two hours ago. She’s been in active labor for forty-five minutes. Contractions are two minutes apart,” Nat said.

“Fetal heartbeat is strong at 120 bpm.” Clint looked up at Phil from where he was crouched near the woman’s belly. 

“That’s good,” Phil said, nodding, and turning to the woman with a confident smile. “Hello Ms. Jackson, I’m Dr. Coulson. We’ll have someone from obstetrics here to help deliver your baby in a minute, and we going to take good care of you in the meantime.” He turned to nurse, and spoke more quietly. “Get me some towels, clamps, and something I can use to suction the baby’s airway.”

Phil looked at Clint with his eyebrows raised in a silent question.

“Still strong,” Clint said, and Phil relaxed a fraction. Where the hell was the obstetrician? 

“Is this your first baby, Ms. Jackson?”

“Cheryl, call me Cheryl, and no, it’s my fourth. I knew I shouldn’t have relied on a taxi to get me to the hospital, but I couldn’t drive myself, and my oldest is only 14, too young to drive. My neighbor was supposed to drive me, but she was down at the grocery store when my water broke, and didn’t think she could get back in time. The stupid taxi driver took one look at me and refused to drive me. The contractions started getting strong while I was arguing with him, and my youngest, she’s seven, panicked and called 911.” This speech was delivered between loud panting breaths, and then Cheryl Jackson gasped and said, “Can’t wait for the other doctor, the baby’s coming now,” and started to grunt and groan through a contraction.

“She’s crowning,” Nat said, and Phil ran through the delivery procedure in his head. He could see the page of his obstetrics textbook, outlining the steps. ‘It’s going to be fine,’ he told himself, and got ready to deliver a baby for the first time in 20 years. 

Then someone tapped him on the shoulder and said, “I’ll take over,” in his ear. Phil stepped aside and let the obstetrician take his place. Behind him a NICU nurse wheeled a cart into place next to Clint and nodded at him to abandon his post. He looked relieved as he straightened up and stepped over beside Phil with a low groan as his spine crunched audibly. 

“That was a close call. When’s the last time you delivered a baby?” Clint asked quietly in Phil's ear. 

“When I was a resident, twenty years ago.” They had moved out of the way, but were watching as Ms. Jackson panted and grunted through a short, productive labor. Within minutes, the obstetrician was clamping and cutting the umbilical cord and laying a squealing, healthy baby girl on her mother’s chest. 

Phil stood there grinning with Clint and Natasha at his side until mother and baby were being wheeled out of the ER to the maternity ward.

“Well,” said Clint, “this calls for a celebration. We’re still on duty, so coffee and pie will have to do to wet the baby’s head.”

“You two go ahead,” Nat said. “I want to talk to Maria about that guy with the heart attack we brought in the other day.”

Phil glanced at her, surprised and wondering if she was leaving Clint alone with him on purpose, but she seemed completely sincere. So he followed Clint towards the cafeteria, and got a coffee while Clint served himself a hot chocolate and a piece of key lime pie.

“Not getting something sweet?” Clint asked.

“Not today. You see someone left a piece of baklava for me at the nurses’ station yesterday evening. I had actually just finished it when you pulled in with Ms. Jackson.”

“Oh, ah. Good. Did you… was it… okay?” Clint stammered and blushed and looked adorable.

“It was delicious, Clint, thank you.”

“I got it from this place on 7th Avenue. They make fantastic shawarma, too. I’ll show you where it is. Um… speaking of which…” Clint put his drink down and took a deep breath. “I’d um… that is to say I was wondering if you’d like to go out with me sometime. On a date.”

“Clint, I’m sorry. I can’t.” Phil felt a pang as he said the words, wishing he felt he could say ‘yes’ instead.

“Are you, uh… with someone? It’s just that you haven’t mentioned anybody, and people usually do, you know, drop ‘my partner’ into the conversation, just to, you know, make things clear up front.”

“No, it’s not that.” Phil paused, wondering how to explain that he just didn’t feel ready to start dating yet. “I’m not - “

“Shit, don’t tell me you’re not gay. Or bi or whatever,” Clint interrupted. “My gaydar’s usually excellent, and well, with the coffee and everything I was pretty sure you were flirting back, at least a little.”

Had he been flirting with Clint? Phil wondered. Probably. Clint was warm and friendly and it was only natural to respond when an attractive young man started paying attention to him. He hadn’t been fair to Clint at all, he thought, and felt awful about that.

“Clint,” Phil said, and reached across the table to lay a hand on his forearm. Clint shut his mouth with a snap, and then looked sheepish.

“Sorry, I tend to run at the mouth like that when I’m nervous.”

“It’s okay. Please, let me explain.” Phil sighed as he tried to figure out where to start. “I was in a serious, long term relationship with another man, until a year ago. It ended badly. Very badly. I, uh…” Phil swallowed against the churning in his stomach that came from even saying that much. “I’m not really over it. And that’s why — that’s the only reason I don’t want to go out with you. I like you Clint, a lot. You’re great, and I wish things were different, but I’m not ready to start dating again yet.”

“Hey, one of the best ways to get over something is to get back up on the horse. We could take things slow. I’m not in any big rush. Just, you know, hang out. Movies, dinner, whatever you like to do. I really like you Phil.” Clint’s face was open and earnest and Phil hated to disappoint him.

“And I like you. I really, really do. And that’s why I’m saying no. I don’t want you to be my rebound relationship. You deserve better than that. I’d hate myself if I hurt you.”

“But - “

“Clint, I’m sorry. We can still be friends. Still have coffee together like this.” Phil knew he sounded like he was pleading, but he couldn't help it.

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” Clint muttered as he pushed himself away from the table and gathered up his cup and plate. “See you around, Doc.”

‘Well,’ Phil thought as he watched Clint beat it out of the cafeteria as quickly as possible. ‘That could have gone a whole lot better.’ He stood and tossed the rest of his coffee in the garbage, his stomach still roiling. Maybe there’d be another emergency to take his mind off the mess of his personal life. And if not, he could go check on Ms. Jackson and the new baby.

~~~~~~

Over the next couple of weeks, Phil found himself missing Clint more and more. And not just because he had to start buying his own desserts again. He missed the man’s quick wit and his sparkling eyes, his 'que sera' attitude towards life and his deep caring for his job and his patients. It had been so nice to have someone in his life again, however peripherally. He caught himself thinking ‘I’ll have to tell Clint that, next time I… oh.’

It was possible that he’d made a very stupid mistake.

He found himself looking up hopefully every time an ambulance pulled into the bay, wanting to see Clint and Nat wheeling a gurney in. They did come in once, while he was on shift, but he’d been busy with another patient and by the time he had a minute, Clint was long gone. He’d caught Nat’s eye as she leaned on the desk at the nurse’s station, chatting with Maria, and she’d shrugged at him. He wasn’t quite so desperate as to ask Clint’s shift partner to act as a go-between. Not yet, anyway.

A couple of days later, however, he got the opportunity he’d been waiting for. 

Clint and Nat came in with an unfortunate gangbanger.

“Single gunshot wound to the abdomen, no exit wound,” Clint announced as they wheeled the gurney into the ER. 

“I can’t believe the fucker shot me. He was waving that little two-bit pop gun around like he was Jesse James. Never thought he actually had the guts to pull the trigger.” The victim was in mild shock and not too much pain. By the looks of the large dressing that Clint had pressed to the man’s stomach, most of the bleeding was internal.

“His BP is good, respiration and heart rate are steady,” Nat said, reading numbers off the clipboard in her hand.

“See if we have an OR and a surgeon available. His BP’s stable, so the bullet may not have hit anything important.”

“Teeny tiny little gun, man. Like a… starts with a ‘D’.”

“Derringer?” Phil said distractedly to the patient while hooking up a heart monitor and swapping the ambulance’s oxygen mask for a cannula.

“Yeah, that’s it. A derringer, like in that episode of CSI. Dunno where the fuck he got it. Still can’t believe the fucker actually shot me. Goddam!”

“Well, the teeny tiny bullet seems to have missed most of your vital organs, but you’re still going to need surgery to take it out.”

“Yeah, man. I want to keep it. Wear it on a chain around my neck. The bullet that didn’t kill me.”

“You’ll have to talk to the surgeon about that.” 

Maria appeared at Phil’s elbow to say that there was an OR available, and the patient could go straight into pre-op. As the orderlies were wheeling the lucky man away, Phil managed to grab Clint’s elbow before he could hurry off in the other direction.

“Hey, how about we get a cup of coffee in the cafeteria?” Phil said, letting go of Clint’s arm. He didn’t want Clint to feel trapped.

“I’m busy. I have stuff to do.”

“Clint, please. I like you and I want us to be friends.”

“Yeah, well you can’t have your cake and eat the golden eggs, you know what I mean?”

Phil cocked his head to one side and tried to work out what that was supposed to mean. He couldn’t help but grin a little. “No, I’m not sure I do?”

“I… oh, damn it. Come on.” Clint led the way to the cafeteria, which Phil considered a small win. Over coffee, Clint tried to explain. “I’m not good with feelings and stuff. I tend to rush into things and just hope for the best, you know? I’ve had my share of relationship disasters, too. And after the last one, which ended up in a messy divorce, by the way, I swore to myself, and to Nat, that I’d take it slower next time. Then I met you. And I tried to do it right. I waited. We did the coffee thing a few times, and I really thought there was a connection between us. And so after two weeks I asked you out, and you said ‘no’. What the fuck am I supposed to do with that?”

“I’m sorry, Clint. I really am. I don’t know what to tell you. I just,” Phil made a frustrated noise. “I miss you. I miss seeing you, and spending time with you, and talking to you, and I’d really, really like to - “ Phil stopped short, staring at something over Clint’s shoulder. “Oh, fuck no,” he said quietly.

Walking into the cafeteria in a group were Nick Fury, the Hospital Administrator (and an old friend of Phil’s), and a small group of visiting doctors from other hospitals in the area. It was some sort of inter-hospital co-operation initiative that Phil remembered reading about in the monthly bulletin. Which he had then had promptly ignored, because it was clearly designed for doctors who were interested in the administrative side of things. Like Grant Ward. His ex. Who was standing there looking tall and distinguished and competent and handsome. Phil’s stomach clenched into a tight knot and he wished he could sink through the floor. 

Clint looked over his shoulder to see what had distracted Phil. 

“Phil, are you okay?” he asked when he turned back, “You look kind of… pale.”

“No. I’m fine.” He leaned towards Clint, hoping neither Nick nor Grant would see him. He couldn’t deal with this. Not now. Not here. Here where he’d come to be as far away from Grant as he possibly could while still working in the same profession in the same city. Here with Clint. Warm, caring, wonderful Clint, who he was refusing to date. 

Phil’s eyes followed the group as they moved closer. Nick seemed to be explaining the Hospital Board’s plans to renovate and re-model the cafeteria. Phil felt like he was frozen in place. He wanted to bolt before Grant saw him, but moving suddenly would just call attention to himself. ‘Maybe they won’t come this way,’ Phil thought, ‘maybe…’ But apparently this was destined to be one of the worst days he’d had in a very long time, because Nick led the group directly to the table where he was sitting rigidly despite a very curious and somewhat concerned look from Clint. 

“Dr. Coulson, of course you know Dr. Grant Ward, Chief of Staff at University General Hospital. He’s part of the co-operation working group, and this - “

“We’ve met,” Phil said, standing abruptly as Nick started to introduce one of the other doctors.

“Hi Phil, how have you been?” Grant Ward said with a wide, fake smile. Phil thought he was going to throw up. “This,” Grant said, turning to the tall, shapely African-American woman on his right, “is Alyssa Jackson, head of the Trauma Center at University General, and my fiancée.” 

“It’s nice to finally meet you,” the woman said, holding her hand out to shake. “Grant has told me so much about you.”

Phil was certain now that he was actually going to lose his lunch, so even though it was very rude, he ignored the outstretched hand and simply said, “Excuse me,” before turning and heading for the nearest bathroom at the fastest pace he could manage without breaking into a run. 

He made it into a stall and leaned over, pressing one arm to his churning stomach and the using the other to support himself on the back of the cistern. He was shaking and his legs were barely holding him up. ‘Fiancée,’ he thought, and that did it: bile rose in his mouth and he heaved into the toilet. He closed his eyes and tried to breath slow, deep, calming breaths. Which was working until he heard a knock on the stall door, and his stomach clenched up again at the thought that it might be Grant. He retched again and then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, trying vainly to pull himself together.

“Phil,” said a quiet, concerned voice on the other side of the door. Clint’s, not Grant’s. “Phil, are you okay? Do you need me to call someone?”

“I’m fine,” Phil lied. “Something I ate didn’t sit right, that’s all.”

“Are you sure? If there’s anything I can do…”

Phil leaned his forehead against the cool tiles of the wall behind the toilet. There was nothing Clint could do. Nothing anyone could do. Nothing that could make him feel less angry, less ashamed. Nothing that could take away the pain and sorrow. Nothing except time. A lot more time, apparently.

“Thank you, but no. I’ll be fine in a couple of minutes.”

“Okay, well, I guess I’ll see you around then.”

“Yes. And Clint? I truly am sorry.”

“Yeah,” said a sad voice from the other side of the door. “Me too.”

~~~~~~

‘This is such a bad idea,’ Phil thought as he walked into the small, dimly lit bar and slid onto a stool. But he wanted a fucking drink. Or several. And the idea of going home to his small, lonely apartment with a bottle for company was too depressing to even contemplate. So instead he was here. The bartender came over, gave Phil a nod, and took his order for scotch on the rocks.

It was still early, just gone seven, and so the place was quiet. Exactly what Phil needed to sit and think and sip his drink and try to pull himself back together. No one would bother him, he hoped. It wasn’t a gay bar, quite, but it saw a mix of all kinds of people, gay and straight, young and old. It was one of those places that you found by word-of-mouth, and then, even though it was in a dubious part of town, came back to for the good service and relaxed atmosphere. Unlike every other bar that wasn’t a dance club, there was no television playing a sports channel suspended from the ceiling. Instead a sound system tucked between the display of bottles behind the bar provided an unobtrusive jazz mix. 

Phil thanked the bartender for his drink and took a sip. The cold scotch slipped easily down his throat, bringing a tingling warmth to his chest which had been cold and tight since he saw Grant in the cafeteria. He put his drink down and flexed his shoulders, rolling them back to try to loosen the tightness there, too. 

‘What am I going to have to do to get over this?’ Phil wondered. He’d been sure that the nine months away, working where he was desperately needed was going to help, but it seemed to have just put things on hold instead. Maybe he needed a fresh start. Move to a different city. But then he’d never see Clint again. Maybe turning Clint down had been stupid. 

Of course it had been stupid. Clint, who was warm and caring, who had come to check on him in the bathroom, even though he was obviously feeling hurt and rejected. Clint who was, not to put too fine a point on it, fucking gorgeous. Maybe it wasn’t too late. Maybe he could explain to Clint that he’d made a mistake, he’d been stupid. He was sorry; could they try again? Sipping his drink, he spun a little fantasy where Clint smiled at him and said, ‘Yes, of course.’ Where they went out to dinner and talked and laughed and had a wonderful time. Where they strolled hand-in-hand through the park afterwards, and kissed by a fountain. Where Phil was bold, and confident and asked Clint to come home with him, and Clint said, again, ‘Yes, of course…’

Phil found his glass empty and ordered another drink. The bar had filled up a little more, people stopping in after work, meeting friends before going out to dinner or a movie. Phil looked around at the people smiling, laughing, flirting. Who the hell was Grant to take that away from him? Why should he let Grant have that power over him? Fuck Grant! Grant and his fiancée. Grant and his ambition. Grant and his self-righteous, condescending attitude. He was going to get over Grant and get on with his life. He was going to talk to Clint, apologize, ask for another chance. In fact, he was going to call Clint. Tonight. Now. 

Phil was reaching for his phone when the bartender came over and gestured at Phil’s empty glass, and then raised an eyebrow. ‘What the hell,’ he thought, and nodded. He took his phone out of his pocket and squinted at it. Scrolled through his contacts until he found Clint’s number. Paused with his thumb hovering over the ‘call’ button. The bartender set his drink in front of him and Phil grinned his thanks and took a large sip. Then he put it back down and tapped the screen.


	3. Chapter 3

Clint had just gotten off shift and was in the convenience store on the ground floor of his apartment building when his phone rang. He put his armload of purchases down and smiled at the young woman behind the counter as he dug his phone out of his pocket.

“Just’a sec, okay Ksenia?” She nodded at him and smiled back. Clint frowned at the ‘unknown caller’ display on his phone before answering. “Hello?”

“Uh, hi, Clint?”

“Yes. Who’s this?”

“Hi Clint, it’s Phil.”

“Phil? How did you get my number?”

“Oh, uh, Natasha gave it to me. I, uh, told her I wanted to apologize to you, and she said something about getting my head out of my ass.”

“Yeah, that sounds like Nat.”

“So I wanted to. Apologize that is. For today. And before. I was an idiot. Am, I am an idiot.”

“Phil, are you drunk?”

“No. No. Maybe a little?”

“Where are you?” Clint had his phone jammed between his shoulder and his ear and was fumbling money to pay for his groceries out of his wallet as quickly as he could, because his hearing aid was making the position extremely uncomfortable.

“At a bar. The Green Room. It’s a few blocks from the hospital.”

“I know where it is.”

“You do? That’s great! Come have a drink with me, so I can apologize properly.”

“Phil, I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Clint tried to ignore the way Ksenia was rolling her eyes at him.

“No, no, it’s a great idea. I was an idiot when I said I wouldn’t go out with you. Because of Grant. It was him. Grant. My ex, today at the hospital.”

“Yes, I know.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I kinda lost it when I saw him like that with his fiancée.” Phil pronounced ‘fiancée’ in a sing-song voice that made Clint grin. The man was drunk. Clint was absolutely not going to go meet him, even if the bar was only three blocks away and he could walk it in five minutes.

“That’s okay, Phil, I understand.”

“I knew you would. I knew you’d understand. You’re great, Clint. So great. You warm and kind and you have such pretty eyes. I was an idiot to turn you down. Please come have a drink with me, please?” The last ‘please’ was almost a whine.

“Phil, I -“ Clint caught Ksenia’s eye, and she was looking at him with an expression that said ‘Go for it.’ He shook his head at her, then sighed.

“Okay, Phil, okay. One drink. Just one. I have day shift tomorrow.” Clint stuffed his wallet back in his pocket, grabbed his phone off his shoulder with one hand, and started to ferry his groceries back to their shelves with the other.

“Me too!” Phil said brightly. “That’s great. Where are you? How long will it take you to get here?”

Clint was putting his carton of milk back in the fridge.

“I, uh, actually I live nearby and I was just picking up some groceries, but I can do that later. I’ll be there in about five minutes.”

“I’ll be waiting,” Phil said in a tone that was probably meant to be flirtatious, but came across as hokey. 

Clint sighed and disconnected the call. “This is a terrible idea,” he said to Ksenia, and then, “why am I telling you this? You’re, like, fourteen.”

“I’m seventeen, and I’ve been watching you make bad decisions ever since I was fourteen. Don’t change now.”

“Smartass,” Clint said.

“Takes one to know one,” Ksenia grinned back.

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll be back later to pick up the milk.”

~~~~~~

Clint walked into the Green Room and looked around. He hadn’t been here in a few weeks, but he saw a couple of people he recognized, and the bartender nodded at him, and then cocked his head towards the end of the bar where Phil was sitting.

“The usual?” The bartender mouthed as Clint headed over, and he nodded gratefully. Clint didn’t drink (with a couple of exceptions that had to do with Nat, vodka, and drowning sorrows after bad decisions) but he didn’t need Phil to know that, especially if Phil was already half in the bag. Phil trying to convince him to have a drink was not something he wanted to deal with tonight, on top of everything else.

So he took the orange juice-and-club-soda that Isaac handed him and slid onto a bar stool next to Phil.

“You came!” Phil said, his eyes going wide and his smile lighting up his face.

“I said I would.”

“Yes, you did. But I wasn’t sure, because I hurt you.”

“No, Phil.” 

“I did. I know I did. I could see it in your eyes when I told you I wouldn’t go out with you. I’m so sorry, Clint.” 

“It’s okay.”

“Yes, it’s okay now, because you’re here, and I’m here, and fuck Grant Ward and his fiancée.” Phil raised his glass for a toast and Clint couldn’t help but grin as he clinked his drink against Phil’s. “So, I want to explain.”

Clint was very glad that Phil wasn't so drunk he was slurring his words, because that would have made it impossible to understand him. As it was the background noise in the bar was making it difficult. “You don’t need to.”

“But I want to. It’s important. You’re important, Clint, so I want you to understand about Grant. Let me explain, please?”

“Okay.” Clint raised a hand to his ear and adjusted his hearing aid.

“Shit, is it too loud in here for you? Let’s go sit over there in the corner where it’ll be quieter.” Clint wasn’t sure he wanted to be in a dark corner with an inebriated Dr. Coulson, but it was true that he'd be able to hear him better.

“Okay,” he said, and used his free hand to steady Phil’s elbow when he climbed off his stool and listed to the side just a little.

“I’m okay.”

“Sure.” Clint kept a firm grip as he guided Phil over to the table and sat him down. “Just out of curiosity, did you have anything to eat between when you lost your lunch and when you came in here?”

Phil’s face fell. “No. I didn’t. I just… I just wanted to sit down and have a quiet drink and I didn’t want to do it by myself at my apartment, you know. Not after… Maybe I’d better start from the beginning.”

Clint covered his smile with a sip of his fizzy orange juice and then said, “That’s probably a good idea.”

“Grant Ward is Chief of Surgery at University General. I was a trauma surgeon at UGH, that’s how we met. We were together for eight years. He had our whole life mapped out. He was going to be Hospital Administrator, and I was going to be Chief of a world-class Trauma Center. We were going to be rich and powerful and well-respected and buy a small mansion in Forest Hills.” Phil paused in his narration and took a sip of his drink, then stared morosely at the melting ice cubes.

“What happened?” Clint prompted.

“I was brought before the hospital board for ordering too many expensive tests on Medicaid patients.”

“Ah.” Clint was at one remove from the sharp end of the way the health care system was failing poor people, but he had spent enough time reassuring patients (and their relatives) that the ambulance ride wasn’t going to cost them anything, so he understood the desperation of people who were terribly sick, but couldn’t afford medical bills.

“Grant testified against me. He repeated conversations that we’d had at home, in the evenings after work, when we were talking about our days. When we were discussing treatment options, bouncing ideas around, you know? He brought that into the hearing.”

“He betrayed you.”

Phil looked earnestly up at Clint. “Yes, that’s exactly right. I asked him, afterwards, why he did it. He looked at me as if I was stupid. He said he couldn’t be with someone who showed such flagrant disregard for the fiscal responsibilities of the hospital, and that I needed to learn that a bleeding heart was not an asset to a Chief Surgeon.” 

Clint looked at the man who had patiently tried to help a drunk with a scalp laceration. Who had squared his shoulders and prepared to deliver a baby even though he didn’t have a clue how to do it. Who worked long hours, for less money than he could get elsewhere, at a community hospital in the poorest part of the city. Who had spent nine months in a war zone patching up resistance fighters and rebels and civilians. Clint shook his head.

“Why the hell were you with a guy like that for eight years?”

“I’ve been asking myself that a lot, since I met you. Fuck Grant Ward. He doesn’t get to mess me up any more. He’s not worth it. You’re worth it, Clint. You’re worth taking a chance with.” Phil leaned in close, his face still earnest. Clint wanted to kiss him, but instead, he swallowed the last of his drink.

“I think it’s about time to get you home, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Yes, that’s probably a good idea. I have to work tomorrow. I’m probably going to have a little bit of a hangover.”

“Take some aspirin with as much orange juice as you can drink, before you go to bed. The fruit sugar’ll help.”

“Good advice.” Phil nodded sagely, “sound advice.” Phil stood up and swayed. Clint blew out his breath and resigned himself to seeing Phil all the way home. He’d worry, otherwise.

Luckily they found a cab quickly, and Phil gave his address without slurring. Clint was relieved that Phil didn't actually live in Forest Hills, but only about five miles away. He was also relieved that the seatbelt laws kept Phil on his side of the back seat, because when Phil realized that Clint was seeing him home, he got decidedly… amorous.

“You have such pretty eyes,” Phil was saying now. “That’s one of the first things I noticed about you, your eyes. And your hands. Strong. Capable. You have great hands.” Phil reached for one of Clint’s hands and grabbed it, then brought it up to his own cheek.

“Phil,” Clint said a little desperately, pulling his hand back. Clint was getting aroused in spite of himself. Phil was so damn adorable. But he was drunk, not to mention emotionally vulnerable. “Phil, this isn’t a good idea.”

“Yes, yes it’s a very good idea. It was a bad idea for me to turn you down. I was an idiot. I was an idiot who was living in the past. I don’t want to do that. I want to move forward, with you, Clint.”

Clint was saved from having to reply by the cab coming to a halt outside an apartment building and the cabbie announcing that he was owed eighteen dollars. Phil started to dig for his wallet, but got tangled in the seat belt. He unbuckled, and waved a hand at Clint, who was reaching for his own wallet. 

“S’okay, I got it,” and Clint watched as Phil carefully extracted a $20 and told the driver to keep the change.

On the sidewalk in front of Phil’s building, Clint hesitated. Long enough for Phil to step in and kiss him. The kiss was hot and wet and sloppily enthusiastic, and Clint couldn’t help but respond to it. Phil had his arms around him and one hand in his hair and it felt so damn good that Clint didn’t want it to stop, even though he knew he should pull away. He should back off, and see Phil to his door, and… 

But, god, the man was a good kisser. And his hands. Phil's strong, sure hands, fumbling just a little, one stroking up and down his spine in long, sensual sweeps and the other massaging the base of his skull. Even as he knew he should be backing off, Clint wrapped his arms around Phil and pulled him in close. He missed the feeling of having a strong body pressed up against his own. Since his divorce he’d been cautious, not wanting to jump into a new relationship right away, so apart from a couple of amiable encounters with friends, he hadn’t been with anyone in a while, and he missed it.

But he had to stop. To pull away. Phil was drunk and this was a bad idea. A very, very bad idea.

“Phil.” Clint tore his mouth away from Phil’s and tried to lean back.

“No, don’t stop. Feels so good, Clint.”

“Phil, you’re drunk and this is a bad idea.”

“I’m not very drunk. Just a little. Really.” Phil looked at him with those gorgeous, earnest eyes. “I want this. I like you so much, Clint. So much.”

“And I like you too, a lot. But we shouldn’t be doing this now, especially not here on the sidewalk.”

“Come up to my apartment,” Phil said with a bright smile as if that solved everything.

“Phil.”

“Please, Clint, please. I’ve been so alone for so long. Please don’t leave me alone.”

“Phil,” Clint said a little desperately now. The sadness in Phil’s voice was breaking down his resolve.

“Please.”

“I’ll walk you to your door, and then I’m going home,” Clint said firmly. That made sense. That was the right thing to do. To make sure that Phil was home safe in his apartment. Then he'd leave. 

“Sure,” Phil said brightly, and pulled his keys out of his pocket. He didn’t fumble them as he slotted one onto the lock on the building’s front door, and seemed reasonably steady on his feet as he let Clint up the two flights to his door, and unbolted two more locks.

“Okay, now promise me you’ll drink lots of orange juice.”

“Scout’s honor,” Phil lifted his right hand, and set on Clint’s shoulder. “Thank you, Clint. You’re a good man,” Phil said, staring earnestly into Clint’s eyes.

Clint ducked his head to hide a blush, and when he looked back up Phil was still staring at him with longing. Those eyes were going to be his undoing, he thought, as Phil leaned in to kiss him again, and Clint did nothing to stop him. Nor did he pull away or object when Phil backed them into his apartment, and pressed Clint up against the wall, plastering himself against Clint’s body. And, oh god, Clint could feel Phil’s hard dick against his thigh, and that made his own cock stand up and take notice.

Phil moaned into his mouth and pressed more tightly against him, rocking his hips a little to create a delicious friction. One of Phil’s hands was in his hair again, and the other was lifting the hem of his t-shirt and sliding up under the fabric, up along Clint’s ribs. Phil pulled away from the kiss.

“Please, please let me. Let me feel you. God, it’s been so long and you feel so good,” Phil moaned.

Clint thought that Phil felt pretty damn good himself. There was obviously solid muscle under the doctor’s navy blue suit and white dress shirt, and the hard dick poking his thigh didn’t feel small. Not that Clint was a size queen or anything, but there was something about an otherwise ordinary-looking guy who happened to have an above-average endowment that was a big turn on. Phil had both hands under his t-shirt now, and was shoving the fabric up into his armpits. Clint had a decision to make. If he was going to stop this and leave, he had to do it now. Phil’s palms rubbed across his nipples and he moaned. Fuck it. Phil wanted this, he wanted this. It was probably going to turn into a disaster, like his love life always did, but right now it felt too damn good to stop. He pulled his t-shirt over his head and dropped it on the floor, then put his hands on Phil’s ass. The slight roughness of Phil’s wool suit trousers felt sensuous in his hands, and he kneaded the pert muscle underneath, pulling their groins together and making Phil gasp.

“Yeah,” Phil murmured, “Oh, yeah.” 

“Yeah,” Clint agreed, and he was starting to feel that things were a bit one-sided, so he started to tug Phil’s shirt out of his pants. Phil was kissing him again; a hot, insistent tongue was in his mouth, licking and suckling and mapping as if he didn’t even need to breathe. Clint tried to unbutton Phil’s shirt. It was awkward with their bodies pressed so tightly together, but Phil got the hint from a poke in the ribs and pulled back just enough to give Clint room. He had his thumbs on Clint’s nipples, now, rubbing slowly up and down, driving Clint wild. Phil started to rock against him in time to the slow rhythm. Clint was amazed by the sensuality of the man pressed against him. Then again, it was often the ordinary-looking, buttoned up ones that had hidden depths. Clint wasn’t complaining, in fact, he was looking forward to getting them both naked and horizontal so that he could fully enjoy those depths.

Clint slid his fingers through the fuzz on Phil’s chest, drawing a quiet moan that was muffled by his own tongue. He ran his hands up Phil's back and along his shoulders, loving the sensation of his palms sliding smoothly over warm skin, but Clint wanted more. He liked being naked, and loved being naked with someone else. He moved his hands to Phil’s wrists, aiming for the buttons on his shirt cuffs. 

Phil misinterpreted it as a signal to stop. He pulled out of the deep kiss, worry in his eyes.

“What’s wrong? ”

“Nothing,” said Clint. Then, “Cuffs. Buttons.” God, the arousal was making him stupid already. But Phil just smiled luminously, and dropped his hands to unbutton his shirt sleeves. He also dipped his head and applied his tongue to one of Clint’s sensitive nipples. Clint was impressed at his dexterity as Phil unbuttoned and suckled at the same time. ‘If he can do that when he’s drunk, he must be some kind of ninja when he’s sober,’ Clint thought. ‘Well, he is a surgeon after all. They need to be good with their hands.’ 

Phil had slid his shirt off and let it drop to the floor with Clint’s. He moved those dexterous hands to the button of Clint’s jeans, and looked up with his eyebrows raised, his mouth still on Clint’s nipple. 

“Go for it.” Stopping was now the furthest thing from Clint’s mind. 

Phil smiled and unfastened Clint’s fly. Instead of pushing his jeans down, though, he slid his hand in and cupped Clint’s hard cock through the fabric of his briefs. Clint gasped.

Phil released his nipple with a slurp and straightened up, licking his lips. “You like that?” he asked, stroking and fondling.

“Christ, yeah. You’ve got great hands.”

“Good. Good. I want to make you feel good. Will you let me, please? ” Phil said, now using his other hand to ease the waistband of Clint’s jeans down over his hips.

“I… sure.” Clint wasn’t sure what Phil meant until he dropped to his knees and started rubbing his face against the fabric that was tightly stretched over Clint’s hard length. “Jesus,” Clint breathed, looking down at the man on his knees in front of him. He had his eyes closed and a blissful expression on his face as he mouthed at Clint’s cock through the fabric of his underwear. The wet heat was driving Clint wild and he pressed his hips back against the wall to stop himself from thrusting forward into Phil’s face. Once Phil had licked the head of his cock through his briefs for a while, he slid them down, and with a sultry glance up at Clint, started to lick and nibble. Clint gasped and moaned.

Phil smiled and wrapped one hand around the base of Clint’s cock to hold it steady while he sucked on it messily. Clint could see his other arm moving, and glanced down to see Phil stroking himself through his suit pants. That was almost as erotic as watching Phil’s face, red lips stretched around the head of his cock, shiny with spit and pre-come. And the noises he was making. Phil was slurping and moaning in appreciation like Clint’s cock was the best thing he’d ever had in his mouth. Clint didn’t know how long he’d be able to last if Phil kept this up. 

Phil grabbed one of Clint’s hands and guided it to the back of his head. Clint slid his fingers into Phil’s hair, but otherwise didn’t take him up on the implicit offer. For one thing, he was enjoying Phil’s attention too much to take over, and for another, he didn’t want to come yet. And if he let himself fuck Phil’s mouth, he knew it wouldn’t take more than a couple of thrusts before he was shooting down Phil’s throat. So instead he just scratched at the base of Phil’s skull with his blunt fingernails, and that made Phil moan even louder. Phil’s hand had dropped to his own dick again and was working himself slowly as he moaned and sucked. Just as Clint was sure he couldn’t hold back much longer, Phil slid off, and looked up.

“Do you want to come in my mouth?” Phil asked, looking thoroughly debauched.

“Is…” Clint took a moment to get his breathing under control. “Is that what you want?”

“I…” Phil looked down shyly then up again. “I’d really like you to fuck me. If you… if that’s something you’d want to do.”

Clint’s cock twitched in Phil’s hand, and Phil smiled.

“Phil, I would love to fuck you. Uh, I assume you’ve got condoms. I’m, uh, healthy. We get tested all the time for work. I guess you do too…” Clint didn’t usually get this flustered about sex, but there was something about Phil. He really, really liked Phil, and fucking was… well it was pretty intimate. Truth be told, Clint was a bit of a romantic at heart, and that was probably why he fell in love so hard and so often, and so disastrously, most of the time. 

But Phil just grinned at him and scrambled to his feet. “Of course, I’ve got everything we need. The bedroom’s through here, come on.” He snatched Clint’s hand and led the way. Clint grabbed the waistband of his jeans and pulled them up enough to be able to stumble after a very enthusiastic Phil. On the way to the bedroom he got an impression of a life in chaos. It looked like Phil hadn’t finished unpacking, and was missing a couple of key pieces of furniture. There was a large sofa, but his TV was sitting on top of a couple of milk crates. There were two large bookshelves full of books, but the dining room table and chairs were cheap folding plastic varieties. ‘I guess that’s what happens when you break up with someone after living together for a long time,’ Clint thought, as he was pulled into a bedroom. 

Clint had a minute to look around as Phil rummaged in the bedside table, tossing items onto the bed. Here the furniture all matched, and everything was neat and orderly. A dark blue coverlet topped the bed, and a suit still in its dry-cleaning plastic hung on the closet door. Phil’s medical diploma was in a frame, leaning up against the wall rather than hanging on it, and there were a couple of moving boxes in the corner. Phil caught him looking.

“I, uh, moved in here a couple of weeks before I left for Syria. I didn’t have a chance to get properly unpacked or settled in.”

“That’s okay, it’s nice.” Clint realized he sounded kind of lame, but Phil didn’t seem to mind, and pulled him in for another searing hot kiss. Clint’s hands were on Phil’s ass again, and he was even more eager to get them both naked, so he reached around and tried to unbuckle Phil’s belt, but he couldn’t figure out the clasp. 

“Here, I got it,” Phil said, pulling back from the kiss. Clint grinned at him and shucked off his jeans and underwear, leaving them in a heap on the floor and flopping onto the bed to watch Phil, who blushed as he stripped.

“I’m, uh, not much to look at,” Phil said, blushing even more under Clint’s appraising gaze.

“You can let me decide that, and I think you look absolutely delicious.” 

Phil smiled through his blush and climbed onto the bed next to Clint. “So, how do you want me?”

“What do you like?” Clint asked.

“I, uh… whatever you want, really. I just…” Phil looked down at Clint’s hard cock. “I just want to feel you inside me.” 

“We can do that,” Clint said, moving to blanket Phil’s body with his own. “We can definitely do that.”

The next few minutes were the kind of touching and exploring that Clint liked best. Naked skin slid warmly over naked skin, hands roamed, tongues tasted and teased. Clint nosed through the hair on Phil’s chest to find a nipple and drew it into his mouth, tonguing and sucking gently. Phil flopped back and moaned.

“Oh, god, that’s so good, Clint. So good.” Encouraged, Clint felt around for the bottle of lube that Phil had dropped on the bed earlier, located it, and flipped the cap open. He could be pretty dexterous himself, in certain situations. He manages to squeeze a large dollop out onto his fingers without spilling it all over Phil’s bed, and reached down to ease his fingers between Phil’s ass cheeks.

Phil moaned even louder this time, and started to babble.

“Yes, oh god yes. Clint yes. More. Give me more, please. Yes, fuck that’s good. That’s so good,” he said as Clint eased two fingers into Phil’s tight hole. And it was tight. If Phil hadn’t been so clearly enjoying himself, Clint would have slowed down. But Phil’s moans and needy pleas reassured him, so he started to work Phil’s ass with his fingers.

“Yes, fuck yes. Oh god, can’t wait for you to fuck me, Clint. Want your cock. It’s been so long. So fucking long. Want you so much.” The litany was doing great things for Clint’s ego, and he ignored the part of his brain that was trying to remind him that Phil was a) drunk and b) probably hadn’t had sex in nine months, because he couldn’t imagine that Phil was the kind of guy who’d go in for a random hook-up while on an MSF mission in Syria. Clint told his brain to shut the fuck up, and went back to enjoying himself. Himself and the warm, sensuous body that was writhing under him and begging for it. 

Clint added a third finger, partly to be sure that he wouldn’t hurt Phil, and partly to hear his reaction, which was a gasp and a long, drawn-out moan. 

“You ready for my cock?” Clint asked after another minute of fucking Phil’s ass with his fingers.

“Yes, so ready. Please. Fuck me, Clint. Fuck me.” 

Clint didn’t need to be asked again. He slid his fingers out and positioned himself between Phil’s legs, pulling one firm thigh up onto his shoulder. He wanted to be able to see Phil’s face, to look into those amazing blue eyes as he fucked him. “Is this okay?” he asked.

“It’s great. Perfect. C’mon,” Phil said, reaching for Clint’s shoulders and pulling him in close.

“Justa sec. Need a condom.”

“I put them there,” Phil said, turning his head and flailing with one hand.

“Yeah, I got them. Just give me a minute here.” Clint tore the packet open with slippery hands (also something he had practice at) and rolled the latex on, then found the lube bottle and added some more, just to be on the safe side. “Okay, here we go.” It wasn’t the sexiest of declarations, but Clint was past thinking clearly about anything. He was almost shaking with his need to sheath himself in Phil’s more-than-willing body. 

Planting one hand on the bed near Phil’s head and using the other to steady himself, he slowly pushed in.

Phil gasped, and Clint stopped, worried that he was causing pain.

“Fuck that’s good,” Phil said, and Clint relaxed and eased in all the way. “Oh, yeah, that’s so fucking good.”

Clint’s eyes were fixed on the blissful expression on Phil’s face. He was… beautiful. There was no other word in Clint’s vocabulary to describe the face of the man under him. The bright blue eyes, all soft and warm, the smile that caused those cute little crinkles at the corners of his eyes that Clint had noticed the very first time they’d met, the thin, messy hair that made Phil look a little vulnerable... Everything combined to make Clint wonder at how incredibly lucky he was to be here, in this moment, sharing this with a gorgeous, smart, warm, caring man. 

“Tell me what you like,” Clint said, wanting to make it as good as he could for Phil.

“Start slow,” Phil said, cupping Clint’s firm ass in his hands, “and then fuck me hard.”

“I can totally do that,” Clint said with a smile, and started to stroke slowly in and out, enjoying both the hot, tight friction on his cock and the sighs and moans of the man under him. 

“So good,” Phil moaned again, and again. “So fucking good, Clint. You feel so good. Filling me up just right. Perfectly. God, you’re so good. You’re amazing. Your cock inside me is perfect. Fuck. Harder. Oh, god, please. Fuck me harder Clint. As hard as you can. Fucking pound me, split me open. I need it, please. Fuck me hard.”

Phil’s words urged Clint on, and drove him crazy. To have a man under him, gasping and moaning and begging for it, begging for his cock, was something that Clint had never experienced before. Clint often, but not exclusively, bottomed. He loved it, but he liked to top, too, on occasion, and Phil was pushing all his buttons. He sped up his strokes and put more power into them, slamming into Phil over and over again in time to inarticulate cries of pleasure. He wasn’t going to be able to keep it up much longer, though.

“Gonna come soon. Tell me what you need,” he gasped out between strokes. He wanted to see Phil come apart under him. 

Phil’s eyes fluttered open. “Your hand. Tight. Real tight. Please.”

Clint smiled and leaned down to kiss Phil once, before shifting his balance so that he could get a hand between them. He grasped Phil’s hot, hard dick in a tight fist, and then drove in, again and again. Phil’s hips rose to meet him as he fucking himself into Clint’s fist with wild cries. 

Clint felt Phil’s ass clench tight around his aching cock and saw him throw his head back, his eyes snapping shut as he cried out a single, long vowel sound. Warm wetness pulsed over his fingers, and as Phil continued to thrust into Clint’s fist through his orgasm, Clint slammed home once, twice more, and he was coming; long and hard and gloriously. He collapsed on top of Phil, sweaty and spent.

Phil kissed his cheek, once, softly. “Thank you,” he said, “that was amazing.”

“You’re welcome,” Clint said with a grin; he wasn’t used to being thanked. “It was pretty great.” Then he buried his face in the crook of Phil’s neck. He so didn’t want to move just yet. It seemed like Phil was on board with that, because he felt strong arms circle his back and hold him. 

“Am I too heavy?” he mumbled into Phil’s ear.

“No, it feels great.”

“Yeah.” Clint relaxed for a few more minutes, but then his wrist started to cramp from the awkward angle on the bed, and his soft cock was threatening to slip out of Phil’s ass. He didn’t want to spill the contents of the condom all over Phil’s nice bedspread, so he heaved himself up. “Gotta move,” he said, and drew back. 

“You can, uh, clean up in the bathroom. It’s the door on the left,” Phil said, gesturing.

“Cool, thanks.”

“Um… stay after? If you want, I mean… I’d like you to stay. Please?”

“Yeah, sure.” Clint felt a warm glow. It would be nice to not sleep alone, for a change, and in the morning they could talk about where this was going. Clint wasn’t particularly looking forward to that conversation, but he knew it was necessary. “I need to be up early, though, I have a morning shift tomorrow. I start at eight.”

“No problem, I start at seven tomorrow. I’ll set the alarm and we’ll be up in plenty of time.” Clint looked at the happy smile on Phil’s face and the warm glow got warmer. 

Five minutes later, he was cuddled up in bed, Phil’s head on his shoulder, thinking that maybe this time things were going to go right for a change.


	4. Chapter 4

Phil woke up to the first quiet ‘beep’ of his alarm clock and swatted the snooze button from long practice. He was about to roll over to grab another seven minutes of sleep before he had to get up, when he suddenly remembered that he wasn’t alone in bed. He turned his head to look at Clint, still fast asleep, hair mussed, drooling a little into the pillow, and looking younger and more adorable than he remembered. 

Then his memories of the previous day and night came crashing in, along with a throbbing headache. Seeing Grant with his new fiancée. Phil’s stomach clenched at the memory, and he felt nauseous again. Going out to the bar for a drink - very possibly the worst decision he'd ever made. Having three (or had it been four?) whiskeys on a completely empty stomach. Calling Clint. Clint actually coming to the bar, and being so kind and sweet and understanding. Clint helping him get a cab home… and then…

‘And then I threw myself at him like the sad, desperate loser I am,’ Phil thought. ‘Hell, I practically assaulted him, kissing him and then dragging him in here and… Oh god.’ Phil went pink in mortification when he remembered begging to suck Clint’s cock. And then begging to be fucked. Phil had always been a little… subby. The term fit no matter how much he hated it. He liked… servicing his partner. He liked being fucked, being used. Not in any kind of degrading way, but being the receptive partner made him feel wanted. It was one of the reasons his relationship with Grant had actually worked for as long as it did. Grant wanted to be dominant, at work and at home. Phil hadn't minded - the home part, anyway. When they clashed at work, well… the end result had been disastrous, eventually.

But what must Clint think of him now? Phil had never been this embarrassed. Getting drunk and throwing himself at Clint like that. He must think Phil was some kind of needy slut. A completely pathetic one, at that, because Clint had heard him losing his lunch over Grant. Phil shook his head. 

‘Well, you’d better kiss the possibility of any kind of relationship with Clint goodbye right now. And you need to wake him up, too. He has to work early, he said.’ 

Phil couldn’t bring himself to reach out and shake Clint by the shoulder, because he couldn’t bear to see the pity that would no doubt be in Clint’s eyes. So instead he crept out of bed and opened a drawer as quietly as he could. He fished out a pair of sweats and an old worn t-shirt, and pulled them on silently, and then slammed the drawer shut. When he turned around, Clint was sitting up in bed and blinking at him.

“Hi,” Clint said, with a small, confused-looking smile. 

Phil didn’t think it was possible to feel any worse than he already did, but looking at Clint sitting up in his bed, hair mussed and blinking the sleep out of his eyes… Phil’s heart ached. He sat down heavily on the edge of the bed, facing away from Clint and swallowed before speaking.

“Clint, I’m sorry,” he said, and then didn’t know how to continue. The silence lengthened, and he turned to see Clint fiddling with his hearing aids. Phil felt like he’d been punched in the gut, and his head was pounding. He was worried he might be sick again. He turned away, hiding.

“I… can you hear me?” Phil asked.

“Yeah, I can hear you just fine,” Clint’s tone was cautious, careful.

“I… I’m very sorry for the way I behaved last night. I was drunk. I’m… I’m not normally like that. I… seeing Grant, it…” He looked at the ground, but spoke loudly enough to be sure Clint could hear him. “But that’s no excuse. I should never have called you. I’m sorry.”

“So, I guess this is the part where you tell me it was all a mistake, right?” There was bitterness in Clint’s voice now, and Phil couldn’t blame him.

“I… I’m sorry, Clint. I don’t know what else to say.”

“Yeah, well I guess you don’t need to say anything.” Clint was climbing out of bed and pulling on his pants. 

“Let me give you coffee and breakfast, at least,” Phil said, standing up and moving towards the bedroom door.

“Don’t bother. I can get my own food.” Clint had pulled on his t-shirt and socks, and stuffed his underwear into the pocket of his jeans. He was at the front door, shoving his feet into his boots without bothering to lace them up.

“I… I really am sorry,” Phil said “I didn’t mean to…” He looked at the ground miserably.

“Didn’t mean to what?” Clint asked. But Phil didn’t have an answer. “Yeah. Whatever. Have a nice life.” And with that he was gone, slamming Phil’s apartment door shut behind himself. Phil dropped his head into his hands and sighed, then pulled himself together and headed for the shower, wincing a little at the soreness in his ass. The sex had been fantastic. He was such a fucking idiot…

~~~~~~

Phil threw himself into his job. It had worked (sort of) for the nine months he’d spent in Syria, it could work here too. He pulled extra shifts when they were busy, and volunteered to cover for his colleagues when they needed to take personal time. He worked 12 hour days more often than not, and went home only to eat, sleep, and do laundry.

He also sorted out his apartment properly. He bought some more furniture, getting rid of the temporary plastic dining room table and chairs and replacing them with antiques he found at a market. 

‘If I’m going to be living here alone, I may as well make the best of it,’ he reasoned, and even considered taking up some sort of hobby, or getting a cat. A rescue, of course. And not a cute little kitten - an older cat that no one wanted; that would suit him perfectly. He spent some of his downtime at work looking at cat rescue websites and thinking about going to visit one of the shelters on his next day off.

Maria looked over his shoulder while he was browsing the _PawsPlus_ website, which specialized in older abandoned cats. He was looking at a picture of a scruffy grey tabby named Captain Whiskers whose profile said she needed daily medication for a liver condition. Phil was quite sure he could manage to give a cat a pill once a day, how hard could it be? 

“Planning on getting a cat?” Maria asked him, her voice skeptical and her eyebrows up in her hairline.

“I was thinking about it, yes.”

“Does that mean you’ll be sticking around for a while?” Maria had obviously also been looking over his shoulder when he'd been browsing the Doctors Without Borders upcoming missions, as well.

“I… maybe. I don’t know. I haven’t really decided yet.” Which was true. He kept going back and forth on it: on the one hand he was settling into his apartment and thinking about getting a cat, on the other, heading off to some far-flung land would solve some of his problems, at least.

“Well, you need to decide before you get a cat.” Maria gave him a hard stare, and Phil was pretty sure she wasn’t just worried about him being a responsible pet owner.

Phil hadn’t thought of that. Of course it wouldn’t be fair to adopt an animal and then give it back in a year or two’s time, because he wanted to do another Doctors Without Borders mission. Did he want that? He’d certainly been thinking about it, on and off, since his disastrous night with Clint. ‘Running away again. Is that how you’re going to solve all your problems from now on, by running away from them?’ 

It would certainly solve the awkwardness he felt every time Clint and Natasha wheeled a patient into the ER. Nat did all the talking, now, relaying the patient’s vitals and history and listing what procedures they’d done before and during transport. Clint kept his eyes firmly on the patient or the ground until they had clearance to leave again, and then he rushed off. Phil missed seeing Clint’s bright eyes. Missed his smile. Missed sharing coffee and dessert with him. Missed how Clint made him feel warm, happy, alive.

~~~~~~

Two weeks later (with furniture, but still sans cat) he had lunch with Nick Fury.

“So, Cheese, how’re you settling back in?”

“Fine, fine,” Phil smiled and lied. “I bought some furniture, and I’m thinking about getting a cat.”

“What happened?” Nick Fury’s one eye had narrowed and pinned Phil, who looked down at the cafeteria table and tried very hard not to blush.

“Nothing. Nothing, I’m fine,” Phil said to the tabletop.

“No.” Fury’s voice was hardened steel. “You’re not fine. Tell me what happened.”

“Um, well, a couple of weeks ago you had one of those inter-hospital co-operation meeting things? And uh, you knew that Grant Ward and I used to be, um… together?”

“Oh shit, Cheese. I’m sorry. I should have warned you he was going to be here. I didn’t think.”

“It’s okay, really. I just. It was a…” Phil refused to use the word ’shock’ even though it was completely accurate, “surprise, suddenly seeing him with… with his ah…” Phil couldn’t even bring himself to say the word, and his stomach was roiling again.

“With his fiancée.” 

“Yeah.” Phil poked at the meatloaf on his tray with his fork, his appetite completely gone.

“I’ll make sure to let you know if he’s going to be in the building again.” Nick said, his voice soft and kind.

“You don’t need to, I’m fine with it, really.” Phil wanted to sink through the floor. He hated feeling so weak and vulnerable in front of Nick, who’d known him since high school.

“You’re fine with the way he testified against you at the disciplinary hearing at University General. Fine with him feeding you to the wolves in order to score political points with the hospital board, which, I might add, probably helped his promotion to Chief-of-Staff. Fine with breaking up with him over it. So fine, in fact, that you went half-way around the world for nine months.”

“How did you know about that?” Phil asked. “The hospital board hearing, I mean?” He hadn’t told Nick. He hadn’t told anyone until his drunken ramblings to Clint on that disastrous night a couple of weeks ago.

“My spies are everywhere,” Nick quipped.

“Look, Nick…” Phil looked up into Nick’s face which was soft with a compassion that he’d never seen before.

“It’s okay to not be fine, Phil,” Nick said gently. “It’s okay to feel like shit. Cut yourself some slack.”

“It’s been almost a year, I should be over it by now,” Phil said bitterly.

“Should? Since when does ‘should’ have anything to do with human emotions? You’re smarter than that, Phil. Take whatever time you need.”

‘I was trying to,’ Phil wanted to shout. ‘I was trying to, and then this gorgeous, young, charming paramedic walked into my ER, and because I’m a such a goddam mess, I fucked that up too!’ But he didn’t say anything. He just stared at the congealing mess on his plate.

“Phil, if there’s anything I can do…” Nick said gently.

“I might get you to write me a letter of recommendation for another Doctors Without Borders mission.” He hadn’t actually been thinking about it all that seriously, but the conversation with Nick was throwing the disaster of his life into sharp focus. In the past couple of years, it seemed like the only thing he’d actually been good at was doctoring in a third-world country, so maybe he should go back to doing just that.

“You know that I will, if you decide that’s what you want to do. But please, Phil, try to stick it out here a while longer, first.”

“I know how hard it is to get ER doctors to work in this area. I won’t leave you in the lurch, Nick, I promise.”

“Thank you, but that’s not what I meant. I’d hate to lose you, of course, but if you want to go I’ll wish you well. I just think you need to give yourself some more time to try settle in here, first. Don’t make any rash decisions, just because things didn’t work out with that paramedic.”

“How did you - “ Phil shut his mouth with a snap. Nick hadn’t been entirely joking when he said he had spies everywhere, obviously. “I’ll try, Nick. I’ll give it a few months, at least, before I make any big decisions. I’m kind of enjoying not having sand everywhere," he tried a grin, "for now, anyway.”

“Good. If you need to talk, I’m here.”

“Thanks, Nick. I appreciate that.” Nick nodded, then stood up and picked up his lunch tray.

“You done with that?” Nick asked, gesturing towards Phil’s almost-untouched food.

“Yeah, I guess so. Thanks,” he said, handing it over. As he watched Nick leave, he thought wistfully about a styrofoam box with Clint’s blocky handwriting on it, sitting at the nurse’s station. It had been so nice, for a couple of weeks, to have someone show he cared in little ways like that. 

Grant had never been openly affectionate, preferring to keep their relationship as private as possible. So while there had been shared lunches, they were always all business, Grant wanting to discuss this or that aspect of hospital policy, the latest in management efficiency, or have Phil just listen and nod while Grant ranted about the incompetency of one of the nurses, orderlies, or administrators.

Well, he had options, at least. He could stay and work here, doing good in the poorest part of the city where he was desperately needed, and try to pull himself up by his own bootstraps. He’d give it a few months, just like he’d promised Nick, and if that didn’t work out, well, there was always somewhere that needed doctors. Haiti maybe, this time, or Zimbabwe…

~~~~~~

“GSW to the chest, tension pneumothorax. BP 80 over 62 and dropping, pulse 146 and rising. He’s probably bleeding somewhere else we can’t see. We started an IV and he’s had almost a full liter of saline.” Nat spoke loudly enough to be heard over the wail of another incoming siren and the clatter of a busy ER. It was 2am on a Saturday and it seemed like every street gang in the area had picked tonight to settle their scores. It was the third gunshot victim Phil had seen since he came on shift at eight, and he already felt dead on his feet.

“Okay, get a bag of O-neg on the pole, and type and match. I need a mask with positive pressure and a chest pack. And probably an extra drain. Call University General or Southwest and see if they can take him as soon as I get him stable enough for transport,” Phil called over his shoulder to the nurse. He lifted the large, blood-saturated dressing on the man’s chest and nodded in satisfaction as pink bubbles started to leak out from under the film of plastic that was taped over the wound on three sides. The collapsed lung was re-inflating, but he needed to get a drain in to clear the thoracic cavity. “Can you wait here and then do the transport? We’re kinda swamped tonight, as you can see.” Phil looked up, expecting Natasha’s face across the gurney from him, but seeing Clint’s instead. 

“Tell me about it, we’re scraping ‘em off the sidewalk by the dozen out there tonight.” For an instant the old wise-cracking grin was on Clint’s face, then it shut down. “Uh, sure, we can probably wait for a bit. Nat’s gone to take a leak, anyway.”

“Thanks,” Phil said, and he wanted to say something else, to keep the conversation going, but praising Clint’s work would no doubt come across as patronizing, and Phil couldn’t think of anything else work-related to say. He was pretty sure something non-work related wouldn’t be welcome. 

The patient started to seize.

Phil said, “Fuck,” very quietly, and then started calmly issuing orders. 

“Hold him down. Stop him pulling his IV out. Get some restraints on him if you can,” he said with a flick of his eyes at Clint.

“On it,” Clint said and Phil saw his strong hands gripping the patient’s arms and pushing him down onto the gurney.

“Diazepam and etomidate, stat. And get me that chest drain.”

“Any idea if he was high when he got shot?” Phil asked, remembering to look up so that Clint could see his mouth, and speak a little louder than usual, considering the background noise.

“Who knows. Probably? Coke, or crack, hell, or even speed, I hear it’s making a comeback. Bath Salts maybe, or E… who the fuck knows?”

“Indeed,” Phil said drily, and then called over his shoulder, “and a dose of naloxone.”

Two nurses had appeared, one carrying a tray, her pockets bulging with vials and syringes, and the other with a set of restraints that Clint helped buckle onto the patient’s wrists and ankles. Once that was done, he stepped back out of the way.

“Uh, if you don’t still need me, I’m gonna go get something to eat. I’ll be back in five.”

Phil looked up, and met Clint’s eyes. “Thank you,” he said.

“No problem.” Clint looked down, and Phil thought he might be blushing, just a little. Phil pulled his attention back to the patient, and got to work. The drugs helped to stabilize him, a clotting factor slowed the bleeding, and the chest drain let his lung expand properly, as well as relieving pressure on his diaphragm and other organs. His blood pressure was stable, and even creeping back up a little, and the Trauma Centre at University General confirmed that they could take him. Phil looked up from his patient and spotted Clint and Nat leaning on the wall across the corridor. He waved them over.

“Thanks for waiting, guys. He’s ready to go.”

Nat shook her head. “I was sure he was a goner when we brought him in. You must be some kind of miracle worker.” 

It was Phil’s turn to blush and he wanted to look down, but instead he held his head high, “No, just a doctor who’s seen more ways a bullet can mangle a human body that I ever imagined. Besides, if Clint hadn’t stopped him from pulling his IV out when he seized, he might not have made it. It was a team effort.” 

Natasha nodded and started to wheel the gurney out of the curtain room. For a minute, it looked like Clint might be about to say something, but then he ducked his head, grabbed the other end of the gurney, and followed Nat. 

Phil didn’t have time to ponder it, there was a kid (he was 19, according to his chart, but he looked about 12 to Phil) with a gash that needed stitching. Phil pulled on a fresh pair of gloves, pasted on a smile, and introduced himself to the kid who was obviously trying very hard to be brave about the blood seeping through the bandage on his arm. Someone had obviously told him to ‘put pressure on it,’ and the poor kid had interpreted that as a death grip. 

“I’m going to inject a local anesthetic. That means I'm going to freeze it," Phil explained when the kid looked even more scared, "and then put a couple of stitches in your arm. It’s going to be fine, I promise.” He looked up into the face of this kid, who was trying so hard not to cry, and smiled gently. “Trust me, I’m a doctor.”

After the stitches, he ordered X-rays for a suspected broken wrist (possible spousal abuse, he noted it on the patient’s intake form and asked the administrator to put in a call to social services), and then spent the next 40 minutes trying to catch up on his paperwork. So. Much. Paperwork. It was times like these that he wished he was back in Syria, where the paperwork amounted to a brief notation of the patient’s age, gender, illness or injury, and treatment. On the other hand, if he never saw another case of leprosy or leishmaniasis, that would be good, too. 

By the end of his shift he was bone tired, but in a pleasantly satisfied kind of way that meant he’d done a good day’s work. Like when he’d been in Syria and had worked all day to alleviate suffering, going back to the roots of a physician’s job. But in Syria, he’d had a cook to give him a meal at the end of a day, and a housekeeper who changed his sheets and washed his clothes… Now that his day was over, he was going home to an empty apartment and a microwaved frozen dinner and a pile of dry-cleaning… Maybe he did need to think more about going back on mission. It was easier, in a way, not to have to worry about the mundane details of life, because life was so unstable to begin with. 

‘But,’ Phil thought as he dropped his white coat in the laundry bin and took his suit jacket out of his locker, ‘That’s a cheat, isn’t it? That’s running away, hiding. Not dealing with my life. I can do this. I can rebuild a life for myself that doesn’t include Grant. I can cook food, and get my laundry done, and keep my apartment clean, and maybe even get that cat that needs liver meds.’ Phil sighed. The picture of himself curled up on the sofa in his apartment, watching TV with an elderly cat asleep on his lap was at once seductive and depressing. 

Phil vacillated between getting a cab and taking the subway home. Then he remembered how many gang-bangers with gunshot wounds he’d treated in the past eight hours, and headed for the cab stand at the edge of the hospital parking lot. He wasn’t paying much attention to the driver as he climbed into the cab, but once he’d given his address, buckled his seatbelt, and settled back he noticed the music playing softly on the stereo. He recognized the song — it had been at the top of the pop charts in the Middle East when he’d left. He looked up and saw a medallion with a Syrian flag in the centre hanging from the rear-view mirror, and smiled. He wanted to ask the cabbie where he was from, but as he was trying to figure out how to phrase it without being offensive, the cabbie gave him a sharp glance.

“Problem mister?”

“No, no, none at all, I was enjoying the music. I was in Idlib until about a month ago, and this song was very popular there.”

“Idlib! I have a cousin in Idlib! Maybe you met him? His name is Hassan Karim. He has a fruit stall in the market.”

Phil smiled, “I don’t think I met him, but I may have. I didn’t get much time for shopping in the market while I was there.”

“Of course, you’re a doctor! You were there working, as a doctor? A surgeon?”

“Yes, with MSF. Doctors Without Borders.” 

The cabbie nodded, his eyes flicking between Phil and the road. “Did you like it? In Idlib? My family is from the south, I’ve never been to the north, not even to visit my cousin.”

“I liked it very much. The people were wonderful. Generous and kind.”

“It is important, in Syria, to be a good host. Especially when someone has come from so far away to help. Would you go back? They will need doctors, surgeons there for a long time, I think.” The cabbie shook his head. 

“I might. I’m thinking about it. I’m going to stay here for a little while first, though.”

The cabbie nodded. “Right now I can’t go back,” he said, looking both sad and defiant.

Phil didn’t ask why, that would have been impolite. Besides, the last thing he wanted was to get into a political discussion.

“But maybe in the future, I will be able to. Maybe many years from now when I’m old, I will go back and sell fruit in the market with my cousin.”

“That sounds good,” Phil said with a soft smile at the young cab driver. 

“Of course by then I will probably have a wife and kids, and I’ll want to stay here. Who knows? Hey if you ever want some good Syrian food, you go to Kebab House on 7th Avenue. My cousin owns it. Best Syrian food in the city. Best hummus, best falafel. You tell him I sent you. Tell him Ahmad sent the doctor who worked in Idlib, he’ll give you the best stuff, for a good price, too!” 

“Thank you very much, I’ll do that.” Phil grinned at the cabbie via the rear-view mirror.

“Here you are.” The cabbie pulled up in front of Phil’s building, and Phil climbed out and paid the fare plus the standard 15% tip. 

The cabbie took his money with a gracious nod of his head. “Salam Alaikum.”

“Alaikum as salam,” Phil answered with a smile, and got a brilliant smile back. “Good night, or morning rather.”

“Good morning, my friend.” The cabbie gave him a cheery wave as he drove off. 

Phil let himself into his apartment, stripped off his clothes, and fell exhausted into bed.


	5. Chapter 5

“When are you going to quit moping? It’s been almost a month.”

“I’m not moping.” Clint pouted.

“You really are, you’re totally moping. Either go get laid and get over him, or get back together with him. I don’t care which so long as you quit moping.”

“I’m not - “ Clint stopped. Maybe he was moping, a little. The thing was, it had been fun seeing Phil at the hospital, taking him desserts, meeting him for coffee. Clint had built a little fantasy in his head that of course Phil would say ‘yes’ when he asked him out, and they’d go to dinner, and then maybe stroll through the park and neck a little, and Clint would be a gentleman, and not press for more right away. He could do the whole taking it slow thing, and it would be great. Except that Phil had to go and ruin it all by saying ‘no’. And then calling him drunk, and having sex with him.

Okay, so the having sex part was mostly on Clint. He had been sober. He could have said 'no'. He should have said 'no'. But how was he supposed to say 'no' with Phil all over him like that, kissing him and touching him. The man was a great kisser, even drunk, and his hands, oh god, his hands. The strong, precise surgeon’s fingers that had teased so much pleasure out of Clint’s body… 

“Fine. I’m moping. But Nat, he was so great, and then it got all fucked up. Which was totally, totally not my fault this time, by the way, so I get to mope a little.”

“A little, yes, but - “

They were interrupted by a call coming in on the radio:

 _Industrial accident at a warehouse. 29-year-old male bleeding profusely from a wound to his leg._

The dispatcher gave the address and Clint turned his hearing aids down and hit the siren button as Nat made a U-turn in the middle of an intersection on a red light. They were three minutes away from the location, but ‘bleeding profusely’ was bad. The dispatcher would patch a paramedic or a doctor in to the 911 call, and they would start talking the bystanders through first-aid procedures, but there was only so much you could do with the contents of a standard workplace first-aid kit. 

They pulled up outside the building and Clint was relieved to see that there was someone in a yellow safety vest holding a door open and waving at them to hurry. The number of times they’d arrived at a large building, only to have to search high and low for their patient… Clint and Nat arrived at the scene at a jog, then stopped short to avoid slipping in the expanding puddle of blood on the tile floor.

“I can’t get it to stop bleeding,” A young Asian man had both hands pressed to a red-soaked towel that was covering the patient’s thigh. “I’m putting pressure on the wound like they said but it won’t stop.” His voice was high, close to hysterical.

‘Okay, this looks bad,’ Clint thought, but carefully didn’t say it out loud.

“I’ll start an IV, you check the wound,” Nat said, already opening her box and stripping the sterile wrapper off a large-gauge needle. 

“Okay, I need you to just stay exactly where you are for a minute,” Clint said, kneeling down next to the patient and opening up his kit. “You’re doing great. My name is Clint. What's yours?"

"Tan," said the young man.

"Okay Tan, you're doing great, and I’m going to take over in just a second.” Clint was pulling a tourniquet and a large pressure dressing out of his kit, and grabbing his scissors, since he’d probably need to cut the fabric away from the wound.

“Line’s in,” Nat said and Clint nodded to indicate he’d heard without raising his eyes. As he moved into position across from the first-aider, he heard the sound of velcro. Nat was putting a blood pressure cuff on their patient.

“Okay, here’s what we’re going to do. On the count of three, you’re going to move your hands, and take the towel away, too. I need to see what’s going on, but I also need to get this new dressing on as fast as I can. But don’t get up right away, okay? Sit back, take a couple of deep breaths. It’s totally normal to feel a little woozy after you’ve been putting pressure on a wound like this for a while.” Clint scanned the small crowd of worried-looking co-workers. “Can someone help him up when he’s ready?” The number of times they’d had the first aider get up too fast, only to collapse, and found themselves with two patients instead of one…

“Yeah, sure thing, hon.” An older African-American woman stepped forward. 

“Great, okay, ready?”

Tan nodded. 

“On three. One, two, three.” The first-aider pulled his hands away from the patient. Clint had his eyes fixed on the leg, and saw a large, deep, ugly gash before a spurt of blood painted his face. He slapped the pressure dressing down and leaned his weight on it.

“Clint, are you okay?” Nat asked.

“Fine. If you’ve got the line in, could you hold this for a second so that I can wipe the blood out of my eyes?” Clint was squeezing his eyes tightly shut and he could feel the warm, sticky blood dripping out of his hair and running down his face.

“You, with the blue hair, come hold this.” A young woman with short-cropped blue-dyed hair and a lip ring stepped forward. “Good. Just like this, right here.” Nat handed the woman the IV bag of saline solution and grabbed a handful of antiseptic wipes and gauze squares. She moved over to Clint, and spoke into his ear.

“I’m going to wipe your face first, okay? Keep your eyes shut.”

“Thanks Nat, go ahead.” She was confident and efficient and soon had most of the blood sponged out of Clint’s hair and wiped off his eyelids and cheeks. 

“Okay, open your eyes now.”

Clint did, and blinked a couple of times. “I’m so gonna need a shower as soon as we deliver this guy,” he said, and then his tone went serious. “It’s his femoral artery, Nat.”

Natasha nodded and reached for her kit. With Clint holding the pressure dressing as tightly as he could, she maneuvered the tourniquet under the man’s thigh, high up near his groin. At a nod from Clint, she tightened the band, and then went back to the readout on the blood pressure gauge.

“87 over 62 and dropping,” she said tersely. “It must still be bleeding.”

“The vessel’s probably retracted up into his leg. There’s not much else we can do. The pressure bandage is just gonna soak it all up.”

“I know.” Nat was speaking quietly into Clint’s ear. “Let’s keep everyone calm and prep him for transport.”

“But…” It sounded like Nat was giving up. True, there wasn’t much of a chance. Clint had seen this kind of thing before, on the battlefield; soldiers with one leg blown off, screaming and bleeding and dying within minutes of the medic slapping on a pressure bandage or a tourniquet. There was one thing, though, one chance.

“Nat, I want to try to clamp the artery. If I can find it, it’ll stop the bleed and he just might make it.”

“We don't have a clamp big enough to stay closed on a femoral artery,” Nat said, not objecting, just making a logistical observation. 

Clint glanced down and lifted a couple of his fingers off the pressure bandage. Nat looked at him sideways.

“It’s the only chance he’s got,” Clint said, dropping his voice even lower. There was no need to alarm the man’s co-workers, who were all still hovering around. Natasha nodded. It was agreement with Clint’s statement, not with his proposed course of action, but Clint knew that she’d back him on this, if it came down to that. She would have objected, otherwise. 

“Do you want to get him onto the gurney first?”

“He doesn’t have much time.”

“Okay, go ahead.”

Clint didn’t want to take the risk of letting the pressure off the wound entirely, and besides, the field was completely obscured with blood anyway. If this was going to work he had to do it by feel. He took one hand off the pressure bandage and Nat replaced it with her own. Then he slid his fingers under the dressing, and into the wound. 

He found himself closing his eyes, and wished for a second that he could turn his hearing-aids off, too, because he needed to focus entirely on the messages coming from his fingertips in order to do this. He dug his fingers deeper into the gash and the patient twitched in response. That was a good sign. Even though he was unconscious, he was still reacting to pain, which meant that his brain hadn’t been deprived of oxygen, yet. If he lost any more blood, though, it would be… Clint could feel the femur under his hand and brought the page of his anatomy textbook up in front of his closed eyes, trying to visualize where the artery was. Arteries sometimes retracted into the wound, which was part of why the pressure wasn’t working. He felt something, a slight pressure against his probing fingers. That might… his fingertips closed around a thick slippery tube. He made sure he had a firm grip on the ragged end of it, and squeezed tight.

“I’ve got it,” he said to Nat. 

“Okay, good. Now all we have to do is get him on the gurney, and into the bus, and for you to not let go until we’re at St. Mary’s."

Clint swallowed. Of course, St. Mary’s had to be the closest hospital. Maybe Phil wouldn’t be on shift. Anyway, he had much more important things to focus on. 

Nat marshaled the first-aider and the rest of the spectators to get the patient onto a backboard, and then lift the backboard onto the stretcher. She retrieved the IV bag from the young woman, and the group of co-workers trailed them to the parking lot, and then stood around uncertainly.

“Someone call his family. We’re taking him to St. Mary’s for now, but he’ll probably get moved to University General or Southwest Hospital once he’s stable. The desk at St. Mary’s will know where he is. Good work everyone,” Clint said, just before Nat slammed the back doors of the ambulance on him.

With the siren wailing and Nat driving as aggressively as she dared (which was pretty damn aggressively) they made it to St. Mary’s in record time. Clint waited in the back of the ambulance, still holding on to the artery in the patient’s leg, while Nat ran into the ER to explain that they needed the help of an orderly to get the gurney out of the bus. And a vascular surgeon, stat.

As they moved carefully out of the ambulance and into the ER, Clint saw with resignation that it was indeed Dr. Phil Coulson who was on duty. Just his luck. ‘Be a man about it, Barton,’ Clint said to himself. ‘And the patient comes first. Your own shit can just wait.’

“29-year-old male fell from a ladder at work. Deep laceration to the inner thigh. Damaged femoral artery. BP 74 over 52, and falling, pulse 122 and thready. One liter of saline in. Barton is holding the artery closed with his fingers.” Nat delivered the sitrep in her usual deadpan. Phil’s eyes went wide as he stared at where one of Clint’s hands disappeared under the blood-soaked pressure bandage he was holding to the patient’s leg. Then Clint saw him straighten his shoulders and nod.

“Send someone to the OR for a vascular clamp. Call ahead to get them to have it ready. Get some O-neg up and type and match. As soon as we get that artery clamped, he’s going to need at least four units. Find out who’s got a vascular surgeon on call.”

Phil had moved to the other side of the gurney, facing Clint. Clint didn’t really want to look up into his face, but watching as he unbuttoned and rolled up his shirt sleeves wasn’t much better. It reminded Clint of Phil unbuttoning his sleeves that night when they -

“How are you doing?” Phil asked softly.

Clint did look up at that. “Me? I’m fine. Well, except for the fact that my hand is cramping something fierce and I’m kinda terrified that my fingers are gonna slip.” Clint hadn’t meant to use the word ‘terrified’. He’d meant to say ‘concerned’ or something professional like that. But Phil’s face went all soft as soon as he said it. 

“It’s going to be fine. Just hold on for a couple more minutes, and I’ll have a clamp on it.”

“Yeah. No sweat.” Clint was trying for casual, but it came out resigned.

A nurse from the OR arrived at a run with two chest trays in her hands.

“We thought, just in case,” she explained as she handed them to Maria, who was setting up an instrument tray and suction equipment next to Phil. 

“Okay, I’m going to take the pressure dressing off now.” 

Clint took a breath and nodded. His fingers weren’t going to slip. He was going to hang on for as long as he needed to, even though the muscles in his forearm were burning now, from the pressure of squeezing his fingertips together around an artery almost the size of a garden hose. The bandage came off, dislodging a couple of clots and causing the wound to ooze. Maria was there with sponges, clearing the field, but being careful not to nudge Clint’s hand.

Phil had picked up the clamp and was holding it with his thumb and middle fingers through the handle loops and his index finger resting on the slim jaws of the instrument. He’d be working mostly by feel, trying to ease the clamp in around Clint’s fingers.

“Ready?” 

Clint looked into Phil’s eyes for a minute, and saw only calm confidence. ‘Yeah, this is the guy you want in a war zone, that’s for damn sure.’ Clint smiled at him, and got a small smile back.

“Go for it, Phil,” he said. He got a wider smile for that.

“I’m going to follow your fingers to the artery. Which ones are you using to hold it shut?”

“Ah, all of them except my pinky. Like this.” Clint held up his left hand, first three fingers and thumb pressed tightly together like a child miming a chicken’s head. “I just kinda grabbed the end when I found it and that’s what happened.”

“That’s fine, I just need to…” Phil closed his eyes in concentration, moving very slowly, feeling his way along Clint’s wrist to the base of his thumb with the tip of the clamp. Clint tried to concentrate on the fact that this was just a medical procedure. Phil was only touching him this way (gently, but surely) because he had no choice. Then Phil stopped moving.

“Something wrong?” Clint asked, when Phil hadn’t said anything, or opened his eyes for a moment.

“It’s… I’m having trouble with the angle. I’m trying to be careful not to bump you, and it means my wrist is bent back in an awkward position. It’s making hard to move the way I need to to get the clamp in position.” 

Clint looked down at Phil’s right wrist. He could see the problem, and a possible solution.

“Um, how about if you came and stood over here, next to me? Then your arm would be at the same angle as mine.” 

“Would that… You wouldn’t feel too crowded?” Phil asked, glancing down at where Clint's hand disappeared into the patient's leg.

“No, it’ll be fine. Whatever works best,” Clint said. ’Whatever gets this done so that I can stop wishing there wasn’t a patient on the gurney between us,’ he thought.

“Okay. Thanks,” Phil looked relieved. The crinkles in his forehead smoothed out and he carefully withdrew the clamp. Then he nodded to Maria and moved around to the other side of the gurney, next to Clint. “Tell me right away if I’m bumping your arm or anything.”

“I will, promise.” 

Phil took a small step closer, angling his torso so that it was almost perpendicular to Clint’s, and as close as he could get without actually touching him. “Here we go.”

Clint tried to ignore how close Phil’s warm, solid body was to his. Phil’s right hand moved in slowly, sliding over Clint’s. They were both wearing latex gloves, of course, but it felt strangely intimate, both of them having their hands inside this poor guy’s leg. Across the gurney from them, Maria kept gently swabbing and suctioning away the blood, in between checking the patient’s heart rate and blood pressure. 

“What made you think to try this?” Phil asked quietly as he inched his hand along the back of Clint’s.

“Saw a medic do it once in Iraq. Buddy of mine got his leg blown off by an IED. He was lying there, screaming, blood spurting everywhere. There wasn’t enough leg left for the medic to get a tourniquet on, so he just reached in and grabbed the artery, and yelled for a chopper evac. Held on all the way to Bagrad. My buddy made it. Lost one of his nuts, though.”

“Just one? Lucky.”

“Yeah, that’s what he thought.”

Clint felt the metal tip of the clamp sliding up the back his index finger, guided by Phil’s. Phil had stopped talking and was concentrating hard now, so much so that he didn’t seem to be aware that he was leaning into Clint’s side. Clint could feel the warmth of Phil’s body and smell his aftershave. He bit his lower lip, and must have flinched or made some tiny sound because Phil stopped moving, stopped breathing. 

“Okay?” Phil asked.

Clint forced his clenched teeth apart. “Yeah. Keep going.”

“Almost there,” Phil said. “I can feel the artery. I’m opening up the jaws of the clamp now. Can you feel it on the underside, by your thumb?” 

“I… I think so? To be honest, my fingertips have kinda gone numb.”

“Okay, I’ve got it.” There was a metallic ’snick’ as Phil squeezed the clamp shut. “You can let go now.” 

Clint relaxed and tried to open his hand. His fingers would barely move. “Heh, not sure I can.” 

He felt Phil’s hand close gently around his wrist and draw it backwards, out of the wound. “Go sit down somewhere quiet. I’ll be there as soon as we’ve packed the wound and prepped this guy for transport.

“I’m fine,” Clint said, though sitting down sounded like an awesome idea.

“I know, but please, go sit down.” Phil made it sound like he was asking a big favor.

“Yeah, okay.” Clint moved a few paces away and sank into a crappy plastic chair in a corner. Phil watched him until he sat, and then turned back to the patient. Within seconds, Nat appeared by Clint's side.

“Are you okay?”

“Why does everyone keep asking me that? I’m fine.” Clint knew he sounded petulant, but he couldn’t help it.

“You don’t look so fine.” Nat had her head cocked to one side and was appraising him intently.

“Yeah, well you try hanging onto a femoral artery for,” Clint glanced at his wrist and had to wipe the face of his watch against his pants to get the blood off before continuing, “17 minutes. God it felt like an hour.”

“You look a little pale. I’m going to get you something to eat. And drink. What do you want?”

“Um.” Clint suddenly realized how thirsty he was. “Juice, or even better, Gatorade. Blue if they’ve got it. And, uh...” His fingers still ached, he didn’t want to have to fuss with a fork. “A brownie, or a granola bar or something like that. Something easy.”

“Coming right up.”

“Thanks, Nat.” Clint gave her a tired grin. One of the things he liked most about Nat was that she never tried to mother or baby him. She bossed him around, sure, gave him a ton of unsolicited advice on how to run his love life, and told him off for dropping candy wrappers on the floor of the bus, but she never told him how to look after himself, and more importantly never tried to do it for him. She would bring him food, but he’d be doing the exact same thing for her if their positions were reversed. He’d done that kind of thing for his buddies in the army tons of times. If your buddy was having a rough time with something, you gave him the Skittles out of your MRE. It was just what you did.

Clint peeled the bloody glove off his right hand and then flexed his fingers, grimacing. He struggled to grasp the cuff of the left glove with stiff, sore fingers. He managed it, just. There was a bottle of hand sanitizer and a paper towel dispenser mounted on the wall above where he was sitting, so he made liberal use of both, and then looked around for a bio-hazard waste bin to toss everything into. There was one across the hallway, so he balled up the gloves and used paper towels and tossed with his left hand. He smiled a small, satisfied smile when they landed right on target.

“Nice toss, are you ambidextrous?” Phil walked over and squatted down by his chair.

“No, I, uh… just for sports and things, I guess; I can shoot a basket or a puck with either hand. I’ve just got good aim.”

“How’s your right hand?”

“Stiff. Sore.”

“Let me see?” It was a question, not a doctor’s order disguised as a polite request, and Phil reached out, but didn’t touch. Not until Clint held out his right hand. Phil shifted around so that he was in front of the chair and took Clint’s sore fingers in his hand. Clint felt awkward about Phil squatting down in front of him like that, and then he remembered that Phil had recently been in the Middle East, where it was perfectly normal to squat. He’d probably done hundreds of examinations in this position. It still felt… weird to Clint, and he tried to pull his hand back.

“Look you don’t have to - “

“Let me?” Phil said, looking up at him with those beautiful blue eyes. “Please?”

Clint stopped trying to pull away and sighed, then nodded. Phil did, after all, have great hands.

Great hands that were currently massaging the joints and tendons of his sore, cramped fingers.

“Natasha not around?” Phil asked. Clint figured he was trying to make conversation.

“She went to get me something to eat. She should be back soon.”

“She probably got caught in the lunch rush. The cafeteria is way too small; there are plans to expand it, but we don’t have the money.” 

Phil was looking down at his hand, so Clint had an excellent view of the tips of Phil’s ears as they turned pink. ‘Why the hell?’ Clint wondered, and then he realized: Some hospital bigwig had been talking about the plans to renovate the cafeteria when Phil had seen his ex that day. 

‘God it must suck to be so messed up about your ex that you literally lose your lunch just because you saw him,’ Clint thought, while Phil continued to work the stiffness out of his fingers. ‘Well, not just seeing him, I guess; seeing him with his new fiancée… Must’ve been like a kick in the balls.’ 

Phil was still massaging his hand with warm, strong fingers, and it felt really, really good. 

“Thank you Phil,” Clint said quietly, and Phil looked up with hope in his eyes.

“Clint, would you - “

“Hey Hawkeye, I got you a - shit, sorry, am I interrupting something?” Nat appeared with a bottle of blue Gatorade in one hand and balancing a couple of foam containers in the other.

“No, we were just - “ Clint looked at Phil, who had dropped his hand and was scrambling back and standing up. 

“I’ll… see you,” Phil said awkwardly.

“Yeah, sure,” Clint said partly to Phil’s back as he hurried away towards the nurse’s station.

“I’m really sorry,” Nat said, handing Clint his drink and a container.

“No, it’s fine. We weren’t… Hell, I don’t know what we were.”

“Come on, let’s go eat in the bus. Unless you want to go talk to him first?” It was clear from her tone that Nat was giving him an option, not making a suggestion, which he appreciated.

“Food first. Then we’ll see about the talking.” 

“Probably a good plan.” Which was a ringing endorsement, coming from Nat. 

Clint followed her out to their ambulance and climbed into the passenger side. He tilted his seat back, uncapped his bottle of Gatorade and took a long, satisfying swallow. Then he opened his container to find a chocolate brownie and two large oatmeal raisin cookies. 

“Thanks Nat, you’re the best.”

“Yes, I am. Eat.”

“Yes ma’am,” Clint said and tried not to wolf the brownie down so fast he didn’t taste it. Nat had chosen wisely, of course. He needed the sugar right now, for sure, but the come-down from a sugar rush would be a bitch, so the two fiber-rich cookies would help smooth things out. Besides, they were soft and chewy and wonderful. He finished the first one, and then closed the container and sat back, sipping his drink.

“So,” Clint said to the universe in general, and Nat in particular.

“So, do you want my advice, or do you want me to shut up and listen?” Nat asked, ever practical.

“Listen first, and tell me if I’m being an idiot.”

“You’re being an idiot.”

“Right, let’s go back to the listen first part, okay?”

Nat grinned at him, “Okay.”

“So I’m still pretty pissed at him for the way he behaved the night he got drunk and I took him home. And I have every right to be. He was an asshole.”

Nat cocked her head and gave a slight nod to suggest that Clint wasn’t entirely wrong in his assessment.

“But I know he’s sorry about that, and he seems to want to try to… I dunno, talk or something. Maybe I owe him that.” Clint still had his head tipped back, but he rolled it towards Nat so that he could see her face. He understood people better if he watched them talk. 

“You don’t owe him anything unless you want to.”

“Yeah, that’s the problem, isn’t it? I liked him, dammit. I really, really liked him, and I guess I still do. No, okay, I know I still do. He’s warm and kind and adorable and… I just like him. So maybe I should give him a chance to… I don’t know, explain, or make it up to me, or something. If that’s what he wants.”

“Sounds like you’re talking about giving him a second chance.” Nat voice sounded carefully neutral.

“I don’t know. I don’t know if I want to do that. I just… I just think he deserves me to listen to whatever it is he has to say. I mean, I’ve been known to pull some asshole-ish moves at times as well.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I’m gonna give him the chance to talk, I think. What do you think?” He was ready to hear her advice now.

“I think you should give him the chance to talk.”

Clint stuck his tongue out at her.

“Eww, your tongue’s covered in chocolate. Finish your drink before you go in to see him.”

“What, now?”

“Unless you want to wait and get all nervous about it, and have this to drag on and on for weeks, which I most definitely don’t." That was a warning, Clint knew. "Finish your drink, then go talk to him.”

“Yeah. Okay, yeah.”


	6. Chapter 6

Phil was surprised when Clint walked back into the ER, and even more surprised when he headed straight over.

“Have you got a minute?” Clint looked a little nervous, and Phil worried that something was wrong.

“Yes, of course. What is it? Is your hand okay?” Phil asked, glancing down at Clint’s right hand.

“It’s fine. This is, uh, personal.”

‘Oh,’ Phil thought. “Come with me.” He led Clint to the break room and closed the door behind them, then waited.

“Uh, so earlier, right before Nat showed up, it seemed like you wanted to say something, or ask me something, or something like that, right?”

Phil nodded. “Yes, I guess I did.”

“So go ahead.”

“Okay.” Phil looked down at his hands, gathering his courage, then back up at Clint face. “I know I’ve behaved very, very badly. And if you want me to leave you alone from now on, I will, I promise. But I like you, Clint. I really like you, and I want… that is I’d appreciate it… Fuck.” He blew his breath out. “I’m actually usually better at having a conversation than this.” 

Clint grinned at him. “S’okay, keep going.”

“I’d really like you to have coffee with me, just to let me explain some things, and see if we can’t at least… Look, I’m not asking for anything. Just coffee, and talk, to start with, please?”

“Yes,” said Clint.

Phil was surprised at Clint’s simple answer, and it must have shown on his face, because Clint grinned at him again.

“I like you too, and I’m usually a pretty good judge of character, despite what Nat thinks, so I figure there’s a good chance you’re not actually as much of an asshole as you seem to be. So I’m willing to hear what you have to say.”

“Good, that’s… good.” Phil wasn’t sure that ‘not actually as much of an asshole’ was very promising, but at least Clint had agreed to hear him out. “Um, when’s good for you?”

“I’m on days until Thursday, then I’m off for three days, then I go to nights.”

“Okay, this is my last day shift, I’m on nights until Friday, and then… does that mean we both have the weekend off?”

“Sounds that way.”

“You’ve probably already got plans.” Of course Clint would have plans for one of his few precious weekends off.

“For Saturday, yes, but I’m free Sunday. Know a good coffee shop?”

“Just the ones around here.”

“I live four blocks away.” Clint put his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels, grinning, as if to say 'Your move.'

“But that’s, I mean this is…” Phil realized that there was no polite way to finish the sentence that he had half-formed. “Sorry, I -”

“It’s a really shitty neighborhood, I know. I live in a building with a bunch of people working two and three crappy service jobs just to make food and rent, and retired people whose pensions won’t stretch to anything better. I was staying there with an old buddy of mine from the Army who was on disability, and couldn’t afford anything better either. Helping him out with the rent while I did my EMT training, you know?”

“Sure, but?”

“He, uh… got into some trouble, spent some time in rehab, then some time in jail. Ended up not making it.” Clint said it casually, obviously not wanting to make a big deal of it.

“I’m sorry,” Phil said.

“Yeah, it happens. Anyway, at first I was still staying there, paying the rent, so he’d have his place when he got out, but after a while, it just started to feel like home. So after he died, I, uh, just decided to stay. The super’s kinda shitty about maintenance, so I help my neighbors out sometimes, fixing things, or, you know, getting in the super’s face to make him to fix things.”

“That’s…” That’s exactly the kind of guy Clint was, and a big part of the reason Phil liked him so much. “That’s really nice of you,” Phil said, and Clint blushed a little and shrugged.

“Anyway, so how about the place on Martin Luther King Drive, the one next to the hairdresser’s, do you know it?”

“I’ve had their buttermilk pancakes many times.”

“With loads of syrup, right? That sweet tooth of yours,” Clint teased.

Phil smiled happily. He wanted this to go well. He wanted… he didn’t know what he wanted, except to spend more time with this man who smiled adorably at him while teasing him about his sweet tooth.

“What time is good for you? We can do brunch, or just coffee.” Phil was trying hard not to push his luck. 

“Brunch sounds good. Around eleven?”

Phil carefully didn’t say ‘It’s a date.’ Instead he said, “Great, see you then. Um, do you want my number? In case something comes up and you have to cancel, I mean?”

“Already got it. From that time you called me, remember?”

“Uh, yeah. Of course. Sorry.” Phil looked down at the floor, embarrassed at the memory.

“Hey, we’ll talk about it Sunday.”

“Yes. Thank you, Clint.”

“Uh, you’re welcome, I guess. See you then.” Clint turned and left, and Phil took a deep, steadying breath, then made himself a cup of coffee as well. He told himself sternly not to get his hopes up, that Clint might well just let him say his piece out of some sense of decency, or fair play. 

‘Besides, it’s not like you want to date him.’ Phil thought. Except he did. And he didn’t. He wanted to spend time with Clint, wanted to go out with him and kiss him and sleep with him and… But he knew how bad an idea that was. He knew if he tried to start a relationship with Clint now, it would just all fall apart because… because he was still a mess about Grant.

If only Clint would give him some more time to… to what? To get over Grant? It had been almost a year. To pull himself together? That didn’t look like it was going to happen any time soon. Besides, it wasn’t fair to expect Clint to wait. Phil sighed, and took his coffee cup with him back to the ER. At least he could go do something he was good at, something he was sure about for the next few hours, to take his mind off the disaster of his personal life.

~~~~~~

For the next few days Phil buried himself in chest pains and kidney stones, young people with broken ankles and elderly ones with pneumonia. Gunshots and car crashes, a frat boy who had (‘Accidentally, I swear!’) swallowed his locker key, and a homeless man who just needed a liter of saline to re-hydrate, a gurney on which to sleep off his mouthwash drunk, and a hot meal to fortify him before he headed back out to the streets. He’d been a veteran, judging by the tattoos on his forearms, and Phil remembered Clint’s story of his friend, the one whose apartment he’d inherited. So he gently asked the man if there was someone he could call, someone at the VA, maybe? But he got a ‘Thanks but no thanks, Doc. I’d be much obliged for a cup of coffee before I go, though.’

So Phil had ordered him a full meal, and then gone to the cafeteria and bought him an extra-large coffee and a couple of oatmeal-raisin cookies for the road.

Shifts done for the week, and completely out of distractions, Phil got to focus on his upcoming coffee (he was being very careful not to even think of it as a ‘date’) with Clint. He spent Saturday morning doing his laundry, including a run to the dry-cleaners for fresh suits. 

Hanging them up in his closet, he realized that a suit was probably much too formal for Sunday brunch at a coffee shop, and panicked. He went through his collection of non-suit clothes, finding a few shirts that were acceptable, but no pants. He had a few pairs of khaki cargo pants from his time in Syria, but they were threadbare and battle-worn and completely wrong for coffee with Clint. He owned a couple of pairs of jeans, and tried them on to see if they still fit, which they did. He pulled on a black t-shirt with one pair and looked at himself in the mirror. 

“Yeah, sure, if ‘old guy cruising’ is the look you’re going for, this is perfect,” he said to his reflection, and pulled off the t-shirt and jeans. In despair he put on a pair of suit trousers and a clean white shirt, put his wallet in his hip pocket, and headed for the nearest mall. 

He walked into a casual men’s store and looked around, carefully not to freaking out at how young all the men in the posters on the walls were, and trying to focus instead on finding a pair of nice-looking casual pants. He was forlornly going through a rack of skinny jeans when a bright chirpy voice from behind him said, “Can I help you with anything?”

Phil turned to find a short, round-faced young woman standing behind him.

“I, uh… I’m looking for some pants,” Phil said a little desperately.

“Okay, what for?”

“Um… what do you mean?”

“Well, for wearing to work, or for the weekends or for going out?” Her voice sing-songed a little at the end of the sentence, as if ‘going out’ was the top of the hierarchy of possible pants-wearing activities.

“Well, I…” Phil decided that honesty was the best policy. This young woman who worked in a men’s clothing store obviously knew much more about current fashions that he did. “The truth is that I’m meeting someone for coffee on Sunday and I… I don’t have anything in my wardrobe that seemed right for Sunday brunch.”

“Ah, a hot date!”

“No!” Phil said quickly. “Not a date. We’re just meeting for coffee to talk.”

“Ah, a pre-date date. Got it. Is she about your age?”

“Um, it’s a he, and no, he’s about ten years younger than me?” Phil wasn't sure why he'd phrased his answer as a question, except that he only had his own best estimate of how old Clint actually was.

The young woman had leaned her elbows on a rack and cupped her chin in her hands, looking at Phil with big brown eyes as she interrogated him ruthlessly.

“Hm… let me think.” Her eyes roamed up and down him as she thought, then she straightened up and took a step back. “What’s that you’re wearing now?” 

“Suit pants, and a shirt. What I wear to work.” 

“But at work I bet you’re wearing a tie, and a jacket, right? And that’s where he’s seen you?”

“Um, a tie, yes, but the jacket’s usually in my locker and I’m wearing, a, uh, lab coat. I’m a doctor. He’s um, a paramedic.”

“An office romance, how adorable!” She clapped her hands together and started to circle around him. “Well, you certainly don’t need new pants for your totally-not-a-date with your paramedic friend. What you need to do is unbutton the top two buttons of your shirt, and maybe roll up your sleeves. I bet you have really sexy forearms.”

Phil gulped at the idea of sexy forearms. “Um, are you sure I shouldn’t...” He gestured helplessly at a rack of pants.

“Okay,” she stepped in close and whispered in his ear. “Don’t tell my manager I said this, but no, you really don’t need new clothes.” She stepped back. “Just be yourself. It’ll be fine, trust me.” She gave him a brilliant smile and Phil found himself smiling back. 

“If, uh, if you say so, miss…”

“Skye, and really, believe me, you look great like that.”

“Um, right, well, you’ve been really helpful, I appreciate it.”

“Happy to help! Good luck with your paramedic.” 

Phil somehow managed to retreat from the store without turning bright red.

~~~~~~

The first thing Phil said to Clint when he showed up at the coffee shop was, “What happened? Are you okay?”

“What?” Clint asked, and then seemed to remember, raising a hand to the purple bump on his temple that sported the red seam-line of a healing cut and three butterfly closures. “Oh, this. It’s nothing. I picked up an overtime shift on Friday night, and I got in the middle of a domestic.” Clint glanced down at where his hands were resting on the table, and Phil could see that his knuckles were skinned. 

“Got into the middle, huh?”

“Battered woman," Clint explained. "She called 911 after her husband left the apartment, but he came back unexpectedly while we were there, and took a couple of swings at me. I wasn’t quite quick enough, and one of them connected. I got in a couple shots of my own when he tried to go after her again, before the cops got there.” Clint said this all as if it was just a normal day at the office for him, which maybe it was.

“Does that sort of thing happen often?” Phil asked.

“Well, it’s not supposed to, of course. We’re not technically allowed to go into a dangerous situation without the cops being there, but sometimes, things happen, like this woman’s husband coming home, or you get called out to a guy who’s slipped in the parking lot and hit his head, and you’re in the middle of treating him when the guy he was having a bar-fight with shows up and wants to finish what he started… It’s one of the reasons I work this area, I, uh, can handle myself, you know?”

“I know. I saw you stop someone from sticking a knife in my back, remember?" 

“Yeah.” Clint seemed a little embarrassed to be reminded.

Phil wondered if Clint was remembering the day they met. Wondered if Clint had felt the same interest, the same attraction as he had in those first few minutes. Wondered if he’d screwed everything up. 

“Look, I’m just going to tell you some things, okay? To try to explain what’s been going on with me and, um, why I behaved so badly that time.” Phil wrapped his hands around his coffee cup for support as he spoke.

“Yeah, okay. Go ahead.” Clint had his elbows on the table, his coffee cup cradled in both hands, and was looking at him over the rim with big, beautiful, puppy dog eyes.

“So this is going to sound kind of lame, but I didn’t realize I was gay until university. I’m from a small town, conservative, Christian, and I was never very interested in girls, but that wasn't a big deal. I was an academic nerd, and I just figured I was a late bloomer or something. I didn’t have very many close friends, either, no one to compare notes with, so to speak.” Phil managed not to blush while admitting just how much of a loser he’d been as a kid.

“That’s not so unusual.” 

“Maybe not. Anyway, at university I was mostly too busy studying hard to get good grades and keep my scholarship up to pay any attention to girls, or boys, but I started noticing some of the guys in my classes. Noticing noticing, you know? And, well, I had an entire university library at my disposal so I started reading up on human sexuality and - don’t laugh at me.”

“I’m not laughing. I’m really not.” Clint was grinning a little.

“I know,” Phil sighed. “It’s so nerdy, learning about my own sexuality from a book instead of from, you know, experience.”

“Hey, some people don’t figure it out until after they’re married and have a couple of kids. Believe me, I dated someone like that once. I’d say you did pretty good.” Clint sounded sincere and it made Phil stop and think for a moment.

“I never thought of it that way, but I guess you’re right. Anyway, so in my second year of med school I, uh, got into a relationship with a classmate. He had a little more experience than me, but not much. We, uh, learned together, and then tried pretty much everything we could think of.” Phil got a leer from Clint for that.

“Yeah, well I’d missed the horny teenager phase, so I was kinda making up for it. Everything was fine until Senior year. He came from money. All he had to do was pass, and his family would set him up in his own practice as soon as he had his diploma. I had to keep my grades up, since I was still on scholarship, which meant more time studying and less time with him.”

“Uh-oh.”

“Yeah. So it ended kinda ugly, but I had finals to study for, so I just put it behind me. Then I was a resident, no time to sleep let alone date. When I finally started dating, it, uh… didn’t go so well. Most people my age had already hooked up, and the gay bars and Grindr aren’t really my scene. Also I guess I was a little desperate and a little gun-shy.”

“That’s a bad combination,” Clint said sympathetically.

“Tell me about it. So I dated pretty much entirely unsuccessfully for a few years. Then I met Grant. We hit it off. He was charming and funny, he dressed well and liked the same music as I did. It took me far too long to realize that everything we had in common was superficial. That our dreams and aspirations, our ah, morals, for lack of a better word, were miles apart. And even then, I made excuses. We’d been together for almost seven years at that point, I was over forty. Deep down I guess I knew the relationship was doomed, but I was pretty deep in denial, so I just… stuck my head back in the sand, you know?”

“Happens to the best of us, man. Remind me to tell you about my ex-wife, later.” 

Phil raised an eyebrow, but continued on with his story, because he knew if he got off track he’d lose his nerve. “I will. So, I think I told you, that night at the bar, what happened. That Grant testified against me at a hospital board hearing ‘for my own good.’ That was when I realized there was nothing between us except eight years of habit and some reasonably good sex. And how little he actually thought of me as a person. He cared more about his future position in the hospital administration, and the politics he had to play to get there, than he did about me or our relationship. So I, uh, left him. And University General Hospital, too. I spent a month finding an apartment and trying to figure out what to do with the rest of my life, then I signed up for the Doctors Without Borders mission in Syria.” Phil stopped talking and took a couple of sips of his coffee. There was an apple-cheese danish sitting on a plate in front of him, but his stomach was churning, so he didn’t touch it.

Clint was sitting opposite him, quietly, waiting for him to continue.

“The thing is, when I got back… well you saw what my apartment looked like. I felt like I had, I don't know, half-a-life or something. That the other half, Grant had… taken. Sorry, that doesn’t make any sense.”

“No, I get it. You used to know how things were, who you were, where you fit, and then suddenly you didn’t any more.”

Phil’s eyes went wide. “Yes, exactly. How did you know?”

“Pretty much how I felt when I left the army. It had been my home, my job, all my friends for fourteen years. Without it, I felt like a half-a-person.”

“Yes.” Phil nodded. “Exactly. So… so when you asked me out, I knew I wasn’t in a place where I could be in a relationship. I really like you, but I hardly even know who I am right now. I don’t… I don’t know what I can give to someone else.”

“You don’t need you to give me anything, Phil,” Clint said gently. 

“Except an apology. For getting drunk, and calling you, and throwing myself at you like some kind of…” ’slut’ was the word in Phil’s mind, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud in the coffee shop.

“Didn’t mind any of that. Minded the next morning when you threw me out.” Clint was looking at him steadily.

“I didn’t -” Phil stopped. “I wasn’t thinking clearly. I was ashamed.”

Clint’s face went stony and he moved to push himself away from the table.

“No, no, not of you, of myself. For being so…” Phil’s voice dropped and he looked down at the table, “wanton.”

“Phil, you were drunk.”

“It… it wasn’t just that. I… While I was in Syria, I didn’t, you know, for obvious reasons. So I, uh…” Phil was blushing bright pink, now, and staring at the table, unable to meet Clint’s eyes.

“You hadn’t had sex in…”

“Almost a year. And you’re,” Phil forced himself to look up, “you’re gorgeous. I just wanted… so much.” Phil blew out his breath and his shoulders slumped in defeat. “But I’d turned you down when you asked me on a date. It was a bad idea to call you when I was drunk and a worse idea to…”

“Throw yourself at me.”

“Yes. To throw myself at you, and I was horribly, horribly embarrassed for having done that, and having behaved so badly. So the next morning, I wasn’t so much kicking you out as… trying to give you a way to leave. Because I assumed you wouldn’t want to have anything more to do with me, after what I'd done.” Phil looked back down at the table, miserably. 

“I see,” Clint said, then took a sip of his coffee. He didn’t say anything for a long time. He seemed to be thinking, considering. Phil was quiet, and waited.

“My parents died in a car accident with I was eight years old,” Clint said into the silence between them.

“I’m so sorry.”

Clint shook his head in dismissal. “I didn't have any close relatives who were interested in being saddled with an extra brat to feed, so I grew up in foster care. I was… clingy as a kid, always wanting attention. That’s… it's not a good way to be when you’re in the system, but I never really learned how to turn it off. I get attached way too quickly, and I react badly to rejection.”

“I wasn’t - “ Phil started to say but Clint held up his hand.

“I know. But I reacted badly anyway. It’s just how I am. So it looks like we’re both at fault here, really.”

“Yes, I guess so.”

“Doesn’t fix anything though.” Clint put his empty coffee cup down on the table and toyed with the handle.

“No, of course it doesn’t.”

“See, here’s the thing,” Clint said, looking up at Phil with an open, earnest face. “I like you. Despite… well, despite everything, I like you. A lot. I mean the sex was pretty awesome, and… anyway, what I’m trying to say here is that… Just waiting around for you to sort out your shit makes me kinda pathetic, you know? So I don’t know if I can do that.”

“Yes, I can see that. I don’t expect you to… that is to say, I’m not asking you to wait around for me.”

“Then what are you asking for?”

There it was. The question that Clint deserved an answer to, if Phil could figure one out. He looked into Clint’s bright, grey-green eyes and said, “I would really like us to be friends. Could we do that?”

Clint stared back at him for a minute, and then grinned. “Yeah, Phil. We can do that.”

“Great. That’s… great.”

“So that means it’s back to coffee and chocolate brownies in the hospital cafeteria when we both have free time, right?”

“Yes, exactly.” Phil was hoping for slightly more. For maybe getting burgers at the end of a shift, or even seeing each other socially—just as friends—if their schedules matched up again, but he didn’t say anything about that. He knew they were walking a tightrope, and if he screwed up again, that Clint had no reason to give him a second - make that third chance. So he smiled and nodded, and tried to pay for Clint’s coffee.

“No, no, that’s cool. I’ve got it,” Clint said. And when Phil tried to object, “I picked up that overtime shift on Friday night, remember? I probably make more than you do when I’m on overtime.”

Phil had to grin at that. “You probably do. St. Mary’s doesn’t pay what most doctors expect to make.”

“Then why’re you working there?” Clint asked, “Just to get as far away from your ex as possible?”

“Partly that, but only partly. I became a doctor because I wanted to help people. I’m working at St. Mary’s for the same reason I went to Syria, because the people in this neighborhood really need my help.”

“Yeah, I get that. I, uh, kinda feel the same way about what I do.”

“I know you do,” Phil said. And realized as soon as the words were out of his mouth that, like it or not, and no matter how much the timing sucked, he was falling in love with Clint Barton.


	7. Chapter 7

“You’re an idiot.”

“Yeah, I know.” Clint sighed. No matter that he and Phil were just friends. And no matter that he’d told Phil point blank that he wasn’t going to wait around for him, that was pretty much exactly what he was doing. It had been two weeks since their discussion, and since then they’d gotten together for coffee three times.

“I mean, how long are you going to keep pretending you’re not dating him? You brought him dinner last night, for fuck’s sake.” Nat was exasperated, verging on pissed at him, and he probably deserved it.

“Burgers, it was just burgers.” Phil had been in the middle of his shift, looking tired, when Clint was at the end of his. All he’d done was picked up some burgers at a local diner and brought them back to the hospital. He’d intended to just drop the bag of food off at the nurses’ station like he used to do with the desserts, but Phil had caught him, and insisted he had time for a break, so they got soda from a vending machine and sat companionably in the break room swapping stories about the Middle East.

“So what’s your plan? Just wait until he comes to his senses and asks you out?” Nat’s tone made it quite clear she thought that was a terrible plan.

“Well, last time I asked him out it didn’t work out so well, so if you’ve got any brilliant ideas, feel free to share.” Clint was trying for sarcastic, but he was pretty sure it was coming out petulant, instead.

“No, I just want to be sure you know exactly how much of an idiot you’re being.”

“I know. Believe me, I know.”

The radio squawked and Nat sat up straight and checked her mirrors. Clint unclipped the microphone and acknowledged the call of “17-year-old male beaten up in a fight, blow to the head.”

They found the address without trouble, and hiked up three flights of stairs carrying their gear. A stout Puerto-Rican woman with grey hair up in a bun answered the apartment door.

“You called for an ambulance, ma’am?”

“My boy, he hurt. He say he got in a fight. You need to check him. Take him to hospital.”

“Yes, ma’am, we’ll check him out. Where is he?”

“In his room, this way.”

The patient’s face fell when he saw two paramedics at the door to his bedroom.

“Ma! What did you go and call them for? I’m fine. I told you, I’m fine! It was just a fight. Nothing serious!”

“Nothing serious! Some pendejos beat up my baby, and he says it’s nothing serious! Look at that bump on his head, it’s the size of an egg. He needs x-rays, maybe a CAT scan!”

Clint knelt next to the desk where the boy was sitting with his homework spread out in front of him.

“Hi. My name’s Clint, what’s yours?”

“Rico,” the boy said, looking down at his hands where they were clasped tightly in his lap.

“Okay, Rico, why don’t you tell me what happened?”

“Some awful boys beat him up! That’s what happened! Look at his face!”

“Ma’am, we need Rico to tell us what happened in his own words,” Nat explained patiently to Rico’s mother, and the woman quieted down.

“I, uh, I was walking home from studying with a friend at the library, and two guys called me a jibaro. I tried to ignore them, but they got in my face, you know. And they, uh, wouldn’t let me pass them on the sidewalk, and then they, uh, they just beat me up.” Rico told his story with only quick glances at Clint, the rest of the time his eyes were on his hands.

Clint shot Nat a glance, and she nodded slightly and gave him a knowing look back.

“Okay, Rico,” Clint said, “I’m just going to look at your head now.” There was a decent-sized egg on his head, with a cut that was scabbed over with crusted blood. “Are these the clothes that you were wearing when they attacked you?” He asked casually as he gently pushed the boy’s hair out of the way and made a show of examining the cut with his penlight.

“Um, yeah. Of course,” Rico stammered, and Clint saw him start to tremble slightly.

“So I guess this didn’t bleed very much.” Clint said, in an easy, conversational tone.

“No, not so much.”

“Good, that’s good,” Clint said. 

Rico relaxed slightly, and Clint shot another glance at Nat. They both knew the kid was lying, probably because of his mother. 

“The boys who beat you up. What did they look like?” Nat asked, and Clint saw Rico stiffen.

“I don’t remember.”

“That’s what he kept telling me, ‘I don’ remember’.” Rico’s mother said. “How could you not remember who was beating you? Were they black, white, I ask him, and he say ‘I don’ remember.’”

“Memory loss indicates that there could be a neurological problem. You did the right thing calling us, Ma’am. We should take Rico to the hospital for some tests.” 

“Oh, Santa Maria. My baby.”

“He’ll be fine, ma’am. Now, we just need to fill in this paperwork.” Nat had produced a clipboard and was getting Rico’s date of birth and other details.

Clint packed up his gear while Nat got the contact information transcribed. 

“We’re taking him to St. Mary’s, ma’am. Do you have someone who can drive you?”

“But, can’t I go with him in the ambulance? He’s my son!” The woman wailed and clasped her hands to her ample bosom.

“I’m sorry, ma’am, that’s against the rules. You can meet us at the hospital.”

“You take care of my baby!”

“We will, ma’am, promise,” Clint said, managing to keep a straight face as he did. He did, indeed, plan to take very good care of Rico. Preferably by finding out how he really got that bump on his head. 

Clint and Nat escorted the boy down the stairs and Clint opened up the back of the ambulance. 

“Hop up and sit in that chair there,” Clint told Rico, indicating one of the two jump seats.

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Nat said, giving Clint a stern look. 

“Just giving the kid a chance to talk, make sure he’s safe.” Clint said, and Nat’s expression softened.

“Yes, okay. I’ll take the scenic route to St. Mary’s.”

“Thanks, Nat.” Clint climbed in and pulled the doors shut. Then he sat next to Rico, “Buckle up,” he said as the ambulance pulled away from the curb.

“No siren?” Rico asked, fumbling with the seatbelt catch.

“That’s just for people who are dying. You’re not dying, are you?” Clint said it with a wide grin.

“No.” Rico was staring at his hands clasped in his lap again.

“So, if I promise not to tell your mother, will you tell me what really happened?”

Rico started to cry.

“Hey, it’s okay. Whatever it is, we can help. Tell me what happened,” Clint said gently.

“I… I’m gay.”

“That’s cool, so am I,” Clint said. 

Rico looked at him in disbelief. “No way!”

“I swear it’s true. Actually I’m bisexual. I sleep with both men and women. Not at the same time though.” Clint grinned, and got a small smile back from Rico. Then Clint asked, “Did you get beat up because you’re gay?”

“No. Well, sort of I guess. I… I had a fight with my… my boyfriend.”

“He did this?” Clint asked.

“Yeah. We, uh, we were screaming and yelling and he grabbed me by the hair and slammed my head into the door.”

“You know that’s not okay, right?”

“Yeah, I mean, I’m not gonna see him any more. That’s what we were fighting about, I wanted to break up with him.”

“Okay, good. Did he hurt you anywhere else?” 

“No.” Rico was looking at his hands again.

“Are you sure?” Clint asked a little more forcefully.

“Yeah, honest.”

“Good. Why were you so scared? Just worried that your mom would find out that you’re gay?”

“It’s a sin. I’m going to go to hell.” Rico’s hand went to the small gold crucifix around his neck.

“Well, some people believe that, sure. But other people believe that God made us this way, and he doesn’t make mistakes.” Clint only very vaguely believed in God at all, but he could understand how scary the idea of a disapproving God must be to this kid.

“Yeah, I know. I don’t know if I even believe in God, anyway. And I think Mama would still love me if I told her. She’d probably scream a lot, and pray a lot, but I think she’d still love me. I’m the youngest, her baby. My brothers and sisters are all married.”

“So what are you worried about?”

“We… we didn’t always use condoms. I’m afraid I might have AIDS. But if I go for a test, I have to tell them who I slept with, and then my boyfriend—my ex-boyfriend—will get arrested. Because he’s nineteen and I’m seventeen. That’s what we were fighting about. He’s a bit of an asshole, but I don’t want him to go to jail. Besides, then everyone would find out that I’m a faggot.”

Clint took a deep breath. “Okay, your boyfriend lied to you. Or he didn’t know the law. It’s not illegal for a nineteen-year-old to have sex with a seventeen-year-old in this state. The law takes the age gap into account. If he was twenty-five, there might be a problem.”

“No, he’s nineteen. He was at my high school last year, that’s how we met.”

“Then you don’t have anything to worry about. And when you get an AIDS test, you don’t have to tell anyone who you’ve been sleeping with unless the test is positive. In which case, you’d want him to know, right? Even if he is a bit of an asshole.” Clint nudged Rico with his elbow, and got a bit of a smile.

“Yeah.”

“Okay. So we’re going to go to the hospital, and I’m going to introduce you to a doctor I know. He’s gay too, and he’s a good guy so it’s okay to talk to him. And he’ll do the AIDS test for you, okay?”

“But won’t it go on my record or something? My mom could still find out.” Rico looked miserable.

“Let me talk to Phil, the doctor I know, about that, okay? I’m sure there’s a way to do it without your mother finding out, and he’ll know how.”

“This doctor, is he your boyfriend?” Rico was looking at him wide-eyed.

“No, he’s just a friend. For now.” Clint grinned at Rico, and Rico grinned back. Clint handed him a tissue. “Here, wipe your face.”

~~~~~~

At the hospital, Rico sat on a gurney in a curtain room while Clint pulled Phil aside and explained the whole story.

“… so he needs an AIDS test, but it can’t go on any record that his mother could access, even though he's a minor.”

“No problem, we’ll do an anonymous test. He gets a code and a phone number to call a week from now to get the results.”

“Great, uh, I can pay for it,” Clint said, and Phil smiled at him.

“I know you would, but that won’t be necessary. Believe it or not, we’ve got a special fund for AIDS tests for non-white teenagers.”

“I believe it. Sometimes the system works, and the charity money actually gets to where it’s needed, right?” 

“Exactly. So, introduce me to your friend.”

Clint led Phil into the curtain room where Rico was waiting, his hands clasped tightly in his lap again. He relaxed a little when he saw Clint.

“Hi Rico, this is Phil, the friend I was telling you about, he’s gonna do your blood test, and it’s going to be free and completely anonymous. No one will ever know about it.”

“Gracias. Thank you. I’ve… I’ve been worried.”

“Yeah, just make sure you always use condoms from now on, right?” Clint reached out and tousled the boy’s hair as if he was the kid’s uncle.

“I will, sir, I promise.”

“Clint. I’m Clint, don’t call me ‘sir.”

“Thank you, Clint.”

Clint gave him a wide smile. “I’m gonna go get a coffee. Phil, do you want anything?”

“No, I’m fine, thanks. But, um, are you going to be around for a few minutes? I... there’s something I wanted to talk to you about.” Phil looked unaccountably nervous, and Clint wondered what was up.

“Yeah, sure. I’ll go find Rico’s mother and reassure her that he’s going to be fine.”

“Great.” Phil started digging through a cabinet for the supplies he needed.

“See you around, Rico,” Clint said as he was leaving, and Rico gave him a grin and a wink. Clint shot him back a thumbs-up, and headed for the cafeteria.

After getting his coffee and reassuring Rico’s mother that the doctor was taking very good care of her baby, Clint found Phil at the nurse’s station.

“Hey, you said there was something you wanted to talk about?”

“Yes, come with me?” Phil still seemed nervous, and Clint now had an idea about what might be going on. He followed Phil to the break room, but they found it occupied by two residents who were fast asleep on the sofa, heads tipped back, snoring softly.

They stepped back into the corridor and Phil glanced up and down. It was obvious he didn’t want to talk out in the open. 

“Look, Phil, I don’t know what this is about, but - “ Clint pointed at the door of a storage closet, and Phil looked relieved.

“Clint,” Phil said when the door was shut behind them, “you were really great with that kid.”

“Thanks. He just needed someone to confide in. Hope you don’t mind I told him you were gay. For a kid like that to know that an authority figure like a doctor is gay too - “

“No, it’s fine. He asked me about it, while I was drawing his blood for the test. He also… um. He also said I should ask you out.” The light in the closet wasn’t great, but Clint was pretty sure that Phil was blushing a little.

“Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t put him up to it, I swear,” Clint said. “I told him we were just friends, but I guess…” 

“No, it’s okay. I… I’ve been thinking. Waiting to get over Grant is stupid. I like you, Clint. I like you a lot. So would you - “

He was interrupted by a sound that made them both duck.

“Was that a - “

“Gunshot, yeah,” Clint said, grabbing Phil by the arm and pulling him down to the floor. “Stay down.” 

They could hear shouting and screaming from the ER. 

A man’s voice: _Who has the keys to the drugs? Tell me, or I’ll shoot you!_

Then Maria’s voice, calm and controlled: _I do. Let her go. Let her go, and I’ll give you what you want._

_I want you to unlock the drugs. You do it now, or I start shooting people._ Clint and Phil looked at each other incredulously. The ER was being robbed for drugs?

_If you shoot anyone, you’ll have to shoot me too, and then you’ll have to figure out which one of these_ —there was a loud jingling noise, presumably as Maria shook her bunch of keys in the robber’s face— _opens the drug cabinet. So why don’t we make a deal, you let everyone leave, except me. I’ll stay as a hostage, and I’ll open the cabinet for you._

Phil and Clint, crouched on the floor of the store-room, grinned at each other in admiration at Maria’s level-headedness.

_You open that cabinet now, or else!_

Then a second male voice: _Hey, let’s do what the lady said._

And a third: _No, we need all of them as hostages. If we let them leave, the cops will just storm in here._

“Shit,” whispered Clint, “there’s three of them. If it was just one, I could jump him while his back was turned, but with three… " he paused for a moment and looked around the store-room that they were hiding in. "I’ll need a distraction.”

There was more shouting and screaming and crying, and then another gunshot, and a murky voice yelling over a bullhorn.

“Is that the cops? What did they say?” Clint asked Phil as he fiddled with one of his hearing aids.

“It sounded like ‘Drop your weapons and come out with your hands up’ I think,” Phil whispered back.

_C’mon Ty, put the gun in her twat if she ain’t moving fast enough._

Clint put his lips near Phil’s ear and whispered, “Okay, I gotta do something about this, otherwise people are gonna get hurt. I don’t suppose there’s anything in here that you could use to MacGyver us a bomb or some tear gas or something like that?”

Phil looked around. There were some cleaning supplies, mops and brooms, spare hand towels and toilet paper, and not much else.

“Sorry,” Phil said. “Even if I remembered enough chemistry to do something with this stuff,” he waved his hand at the bottles of soap and bleach, “we don’t have any way to… ah… deliver it.”

“True. Can you throw?”

“Actually, I play a little basketball, even though I don’t have the height for it.”

“I’m a soccer man myself.” Clint grinned for a second. “Okay here’s the plan. I’m gonna sneak out of here, and crawl over behind the computer station. You stay out of sight in here, and when I give you the signal, start lobbing these jugs towards the nurse’s station. Got it?” 

“Clint," Phil whispered urgently, "maybe we should let the police handle it. They’re trained to deal with this sort of thing.” 

“Trained with a SWAT team and snipers, yeah. But with all these civilians trapped in here, the cops have to stay out and try to talk these guys down. They seem like they’re interested in doing much talking?” Clint was thinking fast. He needed to convince Phil that his plan could work, because he couldn’t do it alone. Not against three guys with guns.

“No,” Phil said, shaking his head as if he hated to admit that Clint was right. 

“Hey, I’m trained too, remember? I know what I’m doing, and I’m actually pretty damn good at it. Believe me, I can handle a few smack heads.”

Phil still didn’t look convinced, but another gunshot and more screaming seemed to change his mind. “Okay, what’s the signal?”

“You’ll know. Wish me luck.”

To Clint’s astonishment, rather than saying ‘Good luck,’ Phil grabbed Clint and kissed him, hard. “Don’t die on me,” he said when they parted, both breathless.

“Not a chance.” Clint grinned then carefully and silently opened the door and belly-crawled towards the action.

Phil busied himself with lining the gallon jugs of soap up by the door. There were three, and a jug of bleach. He left the bleach to the side. ‘As a last resort,’ he thought. 'I don’t want to blind anyone.’ Then he remembered the cut on Clint’s temple from ‘getting in the middle’ of a domestic dispute. He remembered Clint saying that he tended to jump into things without thinking. Phil worried that he should have tried harder to talk Clint out of taking on the robbers by himself.

_That’s all? one of the robbers was shouting. There’s got to be more than that, where’s the rest of the stuff?_

_In the pharmacy in the east wing basement._ Maria answered. She still sounded amazingly calm to Phil's ears.

_You’re lying._ There was a sound of another gunshot, and more screaming. _There’s another cabinet. I swear, if you don’t open it I’ll start splattering people’s brains all over the walls!_

Phil wished he could remember some of the prayers that he’d heard patients’ families reciting in Syria. “Bismi-lahi rahmani rahim,” they started; he remembered that much, and said it softly under his breath. “Allah, most gracious, most merciful,” he muttered, as the shouting and screaming started up again. “Please don’t let my friends die.”


	8. Chapter 8

Clint targeted the second robber. The quietest, jumpiest one. The one who had wanted to let the people go, when Maria suggested it. 'Jumpy Guy', as Clint had started calling him in his head, was looking nervously from Ty, the one with the gun on Maria, to the sliding bay doors, through which Clint could see what looked like an entire SWAT team, to the other guy. The big, brutish one with a sawed-off shotgun in his hands. 

Clint moved just as the Big Guy had loosed off another round into the ceiling, trying to get Maria to open a cabinet that didn’t exist. One hand clamped around Jumpy Guy’s mouth, the other grabbed hold of the barrel of his shotgun, and Clint took him down behind the portable x-ray machine, with an efficient leg-sweep. He still had the moves. And he still had his med-bag on his hip, so he was able to jab the guy with a shot of etomidate. It would keep him out of the action for a few minutes, anyway, long enough for him to deal with the other two. Clint hoped. 

And now, he had a shotgun. Clint sat with his back to the x-ray machine for a second, breathing heavily. He needed to get Maria away from Ty, and then he could go after the Big Guy, at which point, with any luck, the cops would come swarming in to help. 

“Let’s just go with what we’ve got.” Ty was arguing, and asking Maria where the side door was. Right, a side door. As if every single door wasn’t completely covered by cops. Lot and lots of cops. Which is what happened when you took hostages in a fucking hospital ER. Then again, three smack heads who thought busting into an ER waving guns and taking a nurse hostage was a good way to get their fix obviously weren’t awfully bright to begin with. They hadn’t even noticed that one of their team was missing yet, and speaking of which, Clint needed to get a move on.

He carefully checked his sightlines. He couldn’t risk getting anyone hurt with this dumb-ass move. Ty and Maria were still by the drug cabinet, and Big Guy was between them and the curtain rooms with his back to most of the civilians, who were huddled in the waiting area. Good. He moved stealthily. Silently.

“If you don’t give me some more drugs right now I’m gonna -” 

“You’ll what, bozo?” Clint asked, stepping out from behind a whiteboard. “Now Phil,” he yelled, and he saw Phil’s head pop out of the store-room just long enough to lob a jug of soap. Big Guy swung around and fired at the whiteboard, which disintegrated, but Clint was already diving for the Ty’s knees. They both went down in a heap behind the nurses’ station desk. Clint slammed the butt of the shotgun into Ty’s nose with a satisfying crunch. As Ty screamed and scrabbled at his streaming nose, Clint grabbed the handgun Ty had been waving in Maria’s face and ejected the clip, throwing it as far away as he could. Two shotgun blasts ripped into the desk, sending splinters everywhere. 

“As soon as I’ve got his attention, you get out of here,” Clint said to Maria. She nodded.

“You fucker. I’m gonna kill you whoever you are I’m gonna -”

There was a thump as Phil lobbed another gallon jug of soap at Big Guy. It sounded like a direct hit, from the swearing. 'Go Phil!' thought Clint.

Out of the corner of his eye, Clint saw Maria scrambling towards the patients in the waiting area.

Big Guy was turning to see where the projectile had come from, and that was Clint’s chance. The thug got one shot off in Phil’s direction. With a silent plea that Phil was under cover, Clint dropped the shotgun and launched himself at the thug’s back. The next few minutes were a nightmare of fighting dirty: gouging and grappling, swearing and trying not to inhale too much of the guy’s unbelievably rank body odor. Clint had training, experience and flexibility. Big Guy had size, anger, and a mean streak a mile wide. Clint was trying to incapacitate him without doing any serious injury. Big Guy was trying to kill him.

A fistful of rings connected with the side of Clint’s head and rang his bell. He shook it off, kicked Big Guy viciously in the kneecap, and drove an elbow into his solar plexus. It should have put him down, but the robber was on something, probably several somethings, and managed to get his arms around Clint in a bear hug. 

‘Okay, this looks bad,’ Clint thought as they both went down in a heap. One of his hearing aids got knocked out, but he thought he heard Phil’s voice screaming his name, and then there were cops everywhere. Cops pulling Big Guy off of him. Cops hauling him to his feet. Cops holding both of his arms. Cops between him and Phil, who had a very worried look on his face. 

With one hearing aid missing, he couldn't make out the babble of voices shouting questions at him.

“I’m deaf and I’ve lost one of my hearing aids,” Clint said loudly. “I can’t understand you if you all talk at the same time.”

That seemed to do the trick. The hubbub quieted down somewhat, and it became clear that they wanted his name and the name of his shift supervisor so that they could call and check that he genuinely was a paramedic, and not an undercover member of the robber’s gang. 

Clint rattled off his work address and supervisor’s name, and then said, “But ask around, all the doctors and nurses here know me. And my partner should be around somewhere. Natasha Romanov. Red hair, can’t miss her.” One officer was writing everything down. Another had frisked Clint and was looking at his uniform suspiciously. A third was on the phone to the Ambulance Service.

“Can I just give him this?” Clint heard Phil’s voice and turned his head. Phil was holding up his lost hearing aid and an antiseptic wipe. The nearest cop took it from Phil, examined it to make sure it wasn’t some kind of weapon, and then turned to Clint.

“This yours?”

“Yes, please. If it’s not broken, I’ll be able to hear you much better.” The cop shrugged and handed it over. Clint shot a smile of thanks over his head at Phil, who was being hustled off, presumably to answer questions about his part in the fight. Or ‘incident,’ as the cops seemed to be calling it. 

“Hey, the guy I hit with a shot of etomidate. Someone should check if he’s okay. Over there, behind the x-ray machine. A nurse should check him out.” Clint realized he was probably going to get into serious trouble for drugging someone when it wasn’t a medical emergency. Well, it, was, sort of - the guy had a gun pointed at a bunch of civilians. That should count as a medical emergency, as far as he was concerned…

The next few hours were spent telling his story again and again. After the second hour, the cops let Nat in to bring him some food. After the third hour he was told sternly that taking matters into his own hands was stupid and dangerous and that he had recklessly endangered members of the public. Clint figured the cops were jealous that he’d saved the day single-handedly. Well, with help from Phil. and of course Maria, who’d done a superb job of managing the situation to stop anyone from getting hurt. He’d been sure to mention several times how calm and clear-headed she had been. He hadn’t seen her anywhere since the cops had swarmed in. They were probably questioning her somewhere else; making sure her story tallied with his. 

Finally the cops were done, and with a warning to stay in town and be available for further questioning, they told him he could go. He found Phil waiting for him in the triage area.

“You should let me clean that up,” Phil said, gesturing at the side of Clint’s head. Clint put his hand up to his temple and felt a crust of dried blood.

“Yeah, okay, thanks.” Clint leaned tiredly against a gurney, and Phil found a suture tray and pulled on a pair of gloves. It was oddly reminiscent of their first meeting, Phil standing close and tending to a cut on Clint’s head. Clint fought the urge to reach out and touch. To just rest his hand on Phil’s arm to feel his warmth, or to cup his cheek for a moment. For the first time, Clint thought back to the kiss in the store-room, and what it might mean. Come to think of it, hadn’t Phil been saying something about… 'Waiting to get over Grant was stupid…' or something like that. Now was probably a really bad time to bring it up. 

“You don’t need stitches this time, just a couple of butterfly closures. You should think about buying stock in the company.”

Clint looked up to see Phil’s wry smile at the poor joke.

“You were great, Phil, by the way. Absolutely great, with the jugs of soap and everything,” he said, looking into Phil’s eyes. Phil held his gaze for a moment and then dropped his eyes. 

“Thanks,” he said quietly. 

“Are you okay?” Clint did put his hand on Phil’s arm, now, worried that the quiet tone meant there was something wrong.

“Just a little shaken up I guess," Phil said quietly. "I’m, ah… not used to gunfights at such close quarters.” He finished applying the bandages and stripped off his gloves. “I was worried about you.” 

“I’m fine.”

“Yes, I can see that. Did the police clear you to go home?”

“Yeah, you?”

“Yes. Do you want to share a cab? As far as your place, I mean. That is, unless Natasha…”

“No, I talked to her an hour ago and told her to go home. There was no point in her sticking around when we didn’t know how long the cops were going to keep me here.” 

“They were… tenacious, weren’t they?” 

Clint detached himself from the gurney and they navigated their way through the maze of yellow crime scene tape. “That’s one way to put it,” Clint said.

Out on the sidewalk in front of the hospital, Phil came to a halt. “Do, ah… do you feel like getting something to eat? I’m starving.”

“Yeah, adrenalin crash response. I feel like I could eat a horse. Want to head over to the diner?”

“Sounds great.” Phil relaxed and they strolled the two blocks in companionable silence. 

Once they’d started eating, however, the floodgates opened.

“You’d think I was used to that kind of thing, from Idlib, but I was all shaky when it was over and I was talking to the cops.”

“Yeah, well being directly under fire isn’t the same as hearing mortars from a distance. Everyone’s scared shitless the first few times.”

“I guess.” Phil didn’t seem convinced.

“Believe me. The first time my unit took real live enemy fire one guy hyperventilated so bad he passed out, and two others pissed their pants.”

“And you?”

“I screamed.” Clint grinned widely around his mouthful of toast and then swallowed. “I spent the whole time we were under attack screaming like a stuck pig. Could barely talk the next day ‘cause of the damage I’d done to my throat.”

Phil nodded his understanding. 

“There was this one time, years later, when we got pinned down by mortar fire. Ended up losing a couple of guys that day. But for me everything went really clear. I’d heard guys talk about it, like seeing everything in slow motion, so you had time to think and react properly and everything. It had never happened to me until that day. And so I started picking off the insurgents one by one with my rifle. I’d always been a pretty good shot, but that day I just couldn’t miss. Every guy I shot at, I took down, because it was like I could see for miles.”

“Was it like that every time, after that? Clear?” Phil asked.

“Nope, only sometimes, but it kinda started happening more often, and I got to the point where I could sort of will it to happen, you know, but only under a lot of pressure, like in a firefight. Part of why the guys in my unit started calling me ‘Hawkeye,’ because of how well I could shoot sometimes. I had actually applied for a transfer to one of the sniper divisions when this happened.” Clint waved his hand towards his ear to indicate his hearing aids. “It was like that today, though. Clear. From the time I crawled out of that storage closet, all the time I was fighting those three guys, everything was slow and clear.” He was trying to reassure Phil. 

“I was shaking the whole time. I’m amazed I managed to throw those jugs of soap straight.”

“Muscle memory, man." Clint grinned. "Saved my butt more times than I can remember.” Clint had wiped up the last of his eggs with a scrap of toast. “Hey, you sure you don’t want some fat and protein to cushion all those carbs you’re eating?” He gestured at the remains of a stack of pancakes swimming in syrup on Phil’s plate.

“Are you a dietician now, as well as a paramedic?” Phil seemed amused, and shook his head when Clint offered his last slice of bacon.

“Nah. I like this job too much. Lucky, really.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. I had no idea what I was getting into when I started. When I got my discharge, with disability pay, which, by the way, is not enough to even pay for food, let alone rent, but I guess they figure the deaf can still work, no problem... Anyway, they have these career counseling things, and they’ll help you find a training program and pay for tuition and everything. So the counselor guy, he asks me if I have any idea what I want to do? And I say, no, man, I got lousy marks in school and joined up on my eighteenth birthday - ‘cause it was that or I was gonna be homeless, having aged out of the foster care system.” Clint saw Phil’s frown and hoped it wasn’t pity. He didn’t need or want pity, especially from Phil, so he started talking again quickly.

“Anyway, so the counselor guy says, ‘Well, were there any specializations that you were kinda interested in, things you thought might interesting to learn about, guys you admired for the job they did, anything like that?’ And I thought for a minute, and I said, ‘The medics. They were always there. And they had to be cool under fire, like when a guy was pissing himself and screaming for his mother; they had to still think straight and do the right thing even though there was blood everywhere and bullets flying over their heads. I admired the hell out of the medics.’ And the guy grins at me, and hands me a pamphlet about training to be an EMT. I figured what the hell, I didn’t have any better idea, and it couldn’t hurt to try it. It looked like it wouldn’t be boring, at least. And besides, I’d be helping people, and that’d be nice." Clint realized he sounded like he was tooting his own horn, so he changed the subject.

"Anyway, I’ve run at the mouth long enough. That’s my response to stress, I talk your ear off. I should go home, and try to get some sleep. You should too. You look like you’re dead on your feet.”

Clint got a resigned nod from Phil and signaled the waitress who brought their checks. It had started to rain while they’d been in the diner, so they paused outside under the awning.

“So, I guess I’ll see you around,” Clint said, ducking his head a little because he couldn’t bear to look at Phil’s face right now. He wanted to grab Phil and kiss him. He wanted to drag Phil home to his apartment and strip him naked and pull him into bed. Not even necessarily for sex, but just to curl up with a warm body, after the day they’d both had, skin against skin.

“Clint,” Phil said, his voice sounding hesitant.

“What?” Clint looked up, wondering if his hope was showing on his face.

“I know this is stupid, I know you’re fine, but… I have this... feeling. I don’t want to let you out of my sight.”

Clint smiled. “It’s not stupid. Used to happen with the guys in my unit all the time. When we’d been on a bad mission, been under fire, if someone had gotten hurt or maybe we’d lost a guy, we couldn’t bear to be separated. We’d hang out in the rec room together, drinking beer and watching bad movies until we passed out in a heap, like tired puppies.”

“I’m not sure,” Phil said with a rueful smile, “that this is quite like it was with the guys in your unit.”

Phil’s eyes were on him, bright and intense, and Clint felt like he was falling into them. “No,” he said, his voice a little shaky. “No, I guess it’s not. Come here.” He pulled Phil into his arms.

They held each other tightly while the rain beat down on the awning over their heads and people pushed past them to get into the diner. Clint could feel Phil’s heart beating, fast, like his own, and the warm, stubbly rasp of Phil’s cheek against his. He didn’t know which of them moved first, but then they were kissing. Not quite the desperate kiss that Phil had given him in the store-room but not far off. It was hot and wet and full of longing.

One of Clint’s arms was around Phil’s waist, under the silky warmth of his suit jacket, and his other hand came up to cup Phil’s cheek like he’d wanted to do earlier in the ER. One of Phil’s hands was in Clint's hair, thumb rubbing at the base of his skull, and it felt so good that he moaned softly into Phil’s mouth. His hips pressed forward of their own accord and his cock twitched in his pants, looking for friction, for the soft heat of Phil’s groin. 

Phil’s hand was on Clint's bicep and squeezed it, once, and then he pulled his mouth away, and took a half-step back.

“Clint, I want to do this right this time. Much as I’d love to… I want - I need us to go slower. Would you have dinner with me Friday night?” Phil asked, his eyes hopeful. “That is if your schedule - “

“I dunno what’s going to happen with my schedule after today, I might be on suspension or something. But yes, I would love to have dinner with you Friday.”

“Okay, then. It’s a date.”

“That it is. Now go, get your cab. Because if you stand here one more second I’m gonna kiss you again, and then drag you back to my place.”

“As nice as that sounds...” Phil sounded apologetic.

“No, I know. We’re gonna do it right. Dinner. Friday,” Clint said with a sharp, decisive nod.

“Yes. See you then.”

“Yeah.” 

Phil grinned and checked for traffic then dashed across the road to the cab-stand. Clint watched him climb into a taxi, and waited until it had pulled away and disappeared into the rain. Then he headed for his apartment, whistling.


	9. Chapter 9

Phil didn't remember having been this nervous last time he went on a date. Then again, last time he’d been on a date was… he stopped thinking about it, and looked at himself in the mirror. 

He’d showered and shaved carefully, figuring that even if things didn’t end up progressing as far as the bedroom tonight, at least the kissing would be more comfortable than the very enjoyable, but also very stubbly affair from three days ago, outside the diner. 

They’d spoken every day since then, Clint calling him on the day after the ‘incident’ in the ER to tell him that he was on administrative suspension at work, which meant he was working Monday-to-Friday, 9-to-5 doing whatever paperwork they could find for him until they knew for sure that the police weren’t going to press charges against him for reckless endangerment of the public ‘or some bullshit like that’.

He’d called Clint the day after, ostensibly to make sure that Clint liked Italian food, and that the little restaurant he’d picked for their date was okay, but also to tease him about being a bona-fide hero. One of the patients who’d been in the ER waiting room during the ‘incident’ had been singing his praises to the news outlets, and had even captured video of Clint in action. The media had managed to dig up a photo of him in military uniform, and the non-classified parts of his army service record. “Injured Veteran Turned Inner-City Paramedic Hero of the Hour” read the headlines.

“If it gets the cops off my back, and gets me back to work sooner, then fine,” had been Clint’s take on his sudden fame. “I’m gonna go stir-crazy if they make me alphabetize the training manuals again.”

And yesterday, Clint had called him ‘just to say hi.’ Phil had been at work, and the warm feeling of Clint calling just to hear his voice had lasted until the end of his shift.

Now instead of feeling warm, Phil felt nervous. He’d spent much of the last couple of days trying to decide what to wear. Something more casual than his workday suit-and-tie, obviously, but something nice. It was a Friday night date, and he didn’t want Clint to think he’d dressed down for it. When they’d had coffee, he’d worn navy-blue suit pants, and a white shirt, but no tie. He didn’t want to wear the same outfit, and there was no way he was going to brave the mall again. In desperation, he slit the tape on a box that was sitting in the back of his wardrobe, never unpacked after his move, simply labeled “Clothes.” 

It turned out to contain his collection of sweaters. An old, moth-eaten, but very comfy navy blue shawl-neck that he put aside for winter, a couple of horrific Christmas sweaters that he’d received in holiday gift exchanges from co-workers, and at the bottom of the box, a beautiful grey cashmere v-neck. He remembered buying it with his first paycheck as a resident at University General. Something elegant and high quality, to pamper himself. He tried it on over a black t-shirt with his black suit pants, and smiled at the result. He went back and forth on the jacket until he realized that he could take it off at the restaurant, if Clint was dressed casually, so as not to make him feel uncomfortable. Kind of an ‘I only wore this because it might be chilly’ thing.

So here he was, standing in front of the mirror, trying to comb his hair in a way that minimized how thin it looked. The alarm on his phone went off. It was his ‘you need to leave now, no matter what’ alarm, so he put the comb down, and slipped his jacket on. He looked… okay.

~~~~~~

Clint looked fantastic. He was wearing a pair of black jeans with a deep purple dress shirt that had just enough sheen to reflect the light. He was also wearing jewelry. Phil blinked at that, but realized that of course, Clint wouldn’t want to be wearing rings when he was pulling gloves on and off all day, or something around his neck that an unruly patient could grab him by. The necklace was silver, with a small round pendant, and the rings were silver as well. One on his left pinky, and a larger one on the ring-finger of his right hand, inset with black. In his ears he wore small silver hoops. The overall effect was entirely masculine, and incredibly attractive. Phil suddenly felt under-dressed.

He got up from the table and took a step towards Clint as he approached. 

“You look great,” Clint said, reaching for him and pulling him into a hug.

Clint smelled of a citrusy shampoo and an understated aftershave. “You look amazing,” Phil said into his ear.

“Really? This is okay? I, uh, was afraid maybe jeans weren’t dressy enough, but I don’t really have much of anything else.”

“You look great, and plenty dressy enough, believe me. I like the - “ Phil gestured at Clint’s earrings.

“Good,” Clint smiled a relieved-looking smile. “I didn’t want to freak you out, but I wanted to be myself, you know? I mean so far we’ve only seen each other when we were both at work, so…”

“I’m glad you did. After all, the whole point of this is to get to know each other, right?”

“I pretty sure I already know everything I need to know about you,” Clint said with a sly grin as they seated themselves at the small table.

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah. You’re compassionate, brave, loyal, handsome, and a great kisser.”

“And that’s enough for you, is it?” Phil asked with a smile, but he wondered, ‘Why shouldn’t it be? Maybe it is.’ 

“It’s enough to start with,” Clint shrugged and looked down at the table as if he was afraid Phil would think he was shallow.

“Hey,” Phil said, reaching across the table and taking his hand. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to… to imply that I wanted, or needed more than…” Phil blew out his breath in frustration. “It’s just that things have always been a lot more complicated for me when there was someone I liked, someone I wanted to be with.”

“Complicated in what way?”

“I don’t know, just… complicated.” Clint gave him a look. “Yeah, okay, I get it. Maybe I was the one making it complicated, like I was doing with us,” Phil admitted.

Clint shrugged. “Not gonna tell you how to live, or what to feel.”

The waiter came over and took their orders for food and a bottle of wine. 

Phil was quiet for a minute once the waiter had gone, and then said, “What I feel is that I like you very much, and I want to be with you. I’d like us to date, um, exclusively, if that’s okay with you?”

“Yeah, that’s cool. I’m, uh, not seeing anyone else or anything like that.”

“Good,” Phil said before he could stop himself, and Clint grinned.

“Are you the jealous type?”

“More like the insecure type,” Phil said, and blushed a little. 

“Hey, we’re all pretty insecure underneath, I think. That’s why I always rush into things without thinking about them. Doesn’t give me time to worry and get cold feet.”

“What about this time?”

Clint sighed. “This time I tried to take it slow, and I got really, really nervous. That’s kinda… That’s why I kept buying you sweets and leaving them at the nurse’s station. I, uh… didn’t know how else to let you know how I felt.”

“The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach?”

“Something like that, I guess.”

“Well, it worked, in case you still weren’t sure. I’m… I’m really sorry that I was still making everything too damn complicated when you asked me out.”

“It’s okay. I mean it wasn’t, then, but that’s my issue, and I’m sorry, too.”

“You have no reason to be. It must have been tough, growing up in foster care.”

“It pretty much sucked, most of the time.” Clint shrugged, and changed the subject. “So what was it like at work today, have they fixed the bullet holes in the walls yet?”

Phil took the hint and told a funny story about a guy up a ladder spackling the holes in the wall until their food came.

They spent the rest of dinner trading anecdotes about colleagues and patients, with a short break when Clint teased Phil mercilessly about his sweet tooth when they ordered dessert and coffee. By the end of the meal, Phil was feeling completely relaxed in Clint’s company, and happier than he could remember being in a long, long time.

On the sidewalk outside the restaurant, Clint asked, “Did you pick a place around the corner from my apartment on purpose?”

“I didn’t… I don’t know where you live,” Phil stammered in surprise, “I mean I knew you lived near the hospital, but that’s why I know this place, I’ve eaten here a couple of times.”

Clint just grinned at him. “So, do you wanna walk me home?”

“Sure.” And Phil slipped his hand into Clint’s. “Lead on.” That earned him a brilliant smile, and Phil couldn’t help but say, “God, you’re gorgeous.”

Clint blushed. “I’m really not. My face is round and my nose is kinda wide and flat, and I’m just… ordinary-looking.”

“You nose is cute. Especially compared to mine.”

“Yeah, what happened?” Phil’s nose showed distinct evidence of at least one break, not terribly well set.

“Ah, well you know how I said I play a little basketball?”

“Yep.”

“I was on my high school team, until everyone else got taller during tenth grade and I didn’t. One day at practice my face got in the way of a pass.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah. Blood everywhere, but the coach just packed it with cotton wool and gave me an ice pack to put on it and that was that. It hurt like hell for a few days, but I didn’t want to seem like a wimp, so I didn’t say anything. We didn’t know until the swelling had gone down that it was actually broken, and a little crooked. But it was healing by then, so there wasn’t any point in doing anything about it.“ 

They turned a corner and Clint came to a stop outside a shabby five-story red brick apartment building.

“It looks pretty bad, I know. But the inside’s better.” Clint looked down at the sidewalk and shuffled his feet a little. “Look, I, ah, want to invite you in. If you don’t want to, that’s fine, and even if you do we don’t have to, ah, do anything. But if you want to come up, that’d be - “

“I’d like that very much,” Phil said. He really didn’t want the evening to end before he’d at least had the chance to kiss Clint again. And on the sidewalk in front of his apartment in a not-so-great neighborhood maybe wasn’t the best place to be doing that.

“Good. That’s good.” Clint led him through a dilapidated but clean foyer to a staircase.

“Sorry, no elevator, and I’m all the way up top.”

“No problem.” Phil said, and was thankful that he still exercised regularly. He didn’t want to arrive at the top puffing like an old man. He got the idea that Clint was slowing down for him a little, and probably usually took the stairs a lot faster, if not two-at-a-time.

Four flights up and Phil was breathing deeply, but not actually puffing. Clint led him to the end of the hall and unlocked two heavy-duty deadbolts on the door of apartment 4D. It opened onto a wide expanse of hardwood floor and a sparsely-furnished, loft style apartment. Kitchen at one end, ‘bedroom’ at the other. There was an enclosed area to the right that Phil presumed must house a bathroom. The sofa was a big overstuffed affair in an eye-watering shade of purple, but it looked comfortable. The TV wasn’t overly large, and there was a tangle of wires and video game consoles sitting on the floor under it. 

Phil realized that Clint was watching him appraise his living space. 

“I like it,” Phil said. “It’s a lot bigger than my place.”

“Probably not, square footage-wise, the lack of walls makes it look big.”

“You’ve seen my place. It’s a shoe-box,” Phil said, then he realized how close Clint was, and suddenly he didn’t want to be talking about real estate any more. “Clint,” he said, and reached out. Clint moved at the same time, and they were in each other’s arms, nose to nose. 

“Hi there,” Clint said with a mischievous smile.

“Hi.”

“I’m gonna kiss you now, okay?” Clint asked a little shyly.

“Very okay.” It was the best kiss so far, and the previous two (Phil was not counting the time he was drunk) had been pretty spectacular. Clint slipped his arms around Phil’s waist under his jacket. Phil, remembering the reaction it got last time, slid one hand into Clint’s hair and massaged the base of his skull. This time Clint’s response was to move one of his hands to Phil’s ass and grab a handful. Phil would have gasped if his tongue hadn’t been twined around Clint’s. As it was, his hips jerked forward, and he discovered that Clint had slid one leg between his so their groins came together in a delicious medley of heat and friction. Phil was quickly getting hard and he could feel the bulge in Clint’s jeans. For long moments they stood there, pressed tightly together, kissing deeply and rubbing slowly against each other. 

Eventually Clint pulled back. “We could, ah, move this to the sofa. Or the bed. Or we could ah, slow down. If you want.”

Phil closed his eyes, hiding from Clint. It all felt great, really great, and he wanted more, but…

“Hey. What’s wrong?” The hand that had been on Phil’s ass was now gently cradling his cheek. Phil forced his eyes open. Clint deserved honesty.

“I’m embarrassed. About last time, when I was drunk.”

Clint smiled, and kissed him, once, softly. “Don’t be. It was awesome.”

Phil gave him a skeptical look.

“Phil, you on your knees sucking my dick was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life. And I’m totally not just saying that to stroke your ego.”

Phil blushed. “I could, ah, do that again, if you want.”

Instead of answering, Clint asked, “What do you want, Phil?”

Phil tried to answer, but between his embarrassment and the intensity in Clint’s eyes, he balked, and wanted to hide again. Clint somehow knew that, and pulled him into a tight hug, guiding his chin to rest on Clint’s shoulder, and pressing their cheeks together, like they way they had hugged outside the diner, in the rain. Clint held him, close and warm, for a moment and then asked again, whispering into his ear, “What do you want, Phil?”

“I… I want to go to bed with you. I want you to touch me. I want you to fuck me. I want… I want you to want me,” Phil said in a small voice.

“I do want you, Phil. But only if you’re sure, this time, that this is what you want.”

Phil squeezed his arms more tightly around Clint. What the hell had he done to deserve someone this understanding? “I’m sure,” he whispered back. “I’m very sure. I want you. So much.”

“And I want you. Come on.” Clint pulled away, but grabbed Phil’s hand and tugged him towards the bedroom end of the apartment. He hadn’t turned any lights on, but the city light that spilled in through the big loft windows was enough to see by. Clint stopped by the bed and pulled Phil into another deep, probing kiss. This time, his nimble fingers found the hem of Phil’s sweater and slid under it, skimming over the t-shirt he was wearing underneath.

Phil figured that gave him license to do the same, and ran his palms up the silky fabric of Clint’s shirt. Clint moaned into the kiss, and Phil took the cue, rubbing Clint’s nipples through the fabric.

“God, yes,” Clint said, pulling his mouth away from Phil’s and gasping for air. “That’s so fucking good.”

Phil mouthed at the angle of Clint’s jaw, pinching the skin in his teeth very lightly and then sucking a little. 

“It’s okay if you leave a mark. Just saying. Don’t hold back,” Clint murmured as Phil worried the skin with teeth and tongue. Clint had tugged the hem of his t-shirt out of his pants and was sliding his hands up Phil’s back, his palms warm against Phil’s skin. 

“Fuck. Want you naked. Want to be naked with you.” At the sound of need in Clint’s voice, Phil’s hands fumbled on the buttons of his shirt. Naked together would be awesome.

They spent the next few frantic moments eagerly undressing each other, until they reached that awkward stage where they had their socks still on and their pants around their ankles. There was a damp patch on the front of Phil’s boxers, and Clint’s tight briefs were in a similar state, the fabric straining obscenely over his hard length. Clint pulled back first.

“I’m just gonna - “ he said, sitting down on the bed and tugging off his jeans and socks, leaving them on a heap on the floor with his shirt.

“Yeah,” said Phil, joining him on the bed and divesting himself of his socks and pants. He heard the sound of a drawer opening and turned to see Clint setting a bottle of lube and a strip of condoms on the bedside table.

“We don’t need to… I mean, just if - “

“I want to. I want you,” Phil said, and then snapped his mouth shut, afraid of sounding needy.

“Good,” Clint said, reaching for him and easing them both down onto the bed. “Because I want you too.”

Then Clint’s hands were everywhere and Phil followed suit, sliding his palms up Clint’s stomach to his chest and rubbing the pads of his thumbs across Clint’s nipples. He got a very satisfying groan in response, and so went to work, rubbing and pinching lightly. They both still had their underwear on, but one of Clint’s hands slipped under Phil’s waistband and his long fingers were wrapped around one ass cheek, pulling their groins close together. The feel of Clint’s hard dick against his was incredibly arousing, and Phil moaned. 

“Yeah,” Clint said. “Let me hear you. Want to know how good this is for you.”

“It’s good,” Phil gasped. “It’s so good.” Phil writhed against Clint’s body, reveling in the warmth of his naked skin, in the raw sensuality of his lean, hard body, and in the way Clint seemed to abandon himself completely to the sensations of the moment. 

Phil kissed his way down Clint’s throat, across his collarbone, and fastened his lips to one pert nipple. Despite how aroused he was, despite his throbbing cock and how desperate he was for Clint to fuck him, he wanted this to last. He wanted it to go on forever. Clint moaned again, and then his nimble fingers were easing Phil’s underwear down.

“Is this okay?” Clint asked breathlessly.

Phil gave Clint’s nipple one more wide lick and then said, “Yes. It’s good.”

“Yeah,” Clint agreed, shoving his own underwear down and kicking it out of the way. He wrapped his hand around both of their hard cocks and stroked slowly. 

Phil looked up and found himself staring into Clint’s eyes from inches away. Clint’s fist was pumping them both in a gentle rhythm.

“What do you want?” Clint asked again, his eyes serious.

‘Anything,’ was the answer in Phil’s mind, but he bit it back. And then thought, ‘But I should be honest with him.’ So he said, “I want anything you want. But I’d really, really like you to fuck me.”

“We can totally do that,” Clint said, kissing him, and then pulling back. His hand was still making lazy strokes on their cocks. “Do you usually bottom?”

“I… yes. Is that… is that a problem for you?”

“No, not at all. A lot of the guys I’ve been with wanted me to bottom, and I’m fine with it, but I like topping too. I like it a lot.”

Phil smiled what was probably a relieved smile. “Good. I’m, uh, glad.”

“Hey,” Clint said, kissing him again, “it’s fine. Whatever we do is fine with me. I think you’re sexy as hell, and I’m very happy you’re in my bed.”

Phil blushed. “I’m… I’m not much to look at.”

“Dr. Phil Coulson, you are sexy and adorable and if I didn’t want to fuck you so much right now I would spend hours licking every inch of your gorgeous body. Got it?” How Clint managed to look completely serious with a wicked smile on his face, Phil had no idea. He laughed. 

“Yes, got it.” He reached over to the bedside table and grabbed the bottle of lube, and put it in Clint’s hand. “Get on with it then.”

“Impatient,” Clint chided.

“Only when the amazing man I’m naked in bed with is taking his sweet time,” Phil said, and almost blushed again at being so forward and demanding. But Clint just laughed. 

“Flattery will get you everywhere,” he said, “But let’s wait on the lube. Because I was serious about the licking every inch of you bit. Or, you know, maybe just a few inches in particular.” One of Clint’s fingers delved between Phil’s ass cheeks to make it perfectly clear which ‘few inches’ he was talking about.

Phil groaned. “Yes please,” and he started to roll over to give Clint access.

“Not so fast.” Clint licked his lips, and Phil almost moaned again at the sight. “I wanna have some fun first.” He pushed gently on Phil’s shoulder, urging him onto his back. “This okay?”

“Fine. Great,” Phil said, trying to get his brain back online, because the idea of Clint rimming him had nearly shorted it out.

“Good.” Clint straddled him on hands and knees and kissed him senseless. Then he started to work his way downwards, kissing Phil’s jaw and neck, and keeping up a somewhat breathless running commentary while he did.

“Want to show you how much I want you,” he said, nosing through the coarse dark hair on Phil’s chest and pausing to tease a nipple with his tongue. “I was supposed to be taking a break from dating when I met you.” Clint dropped one kiss on each of Phil’s ribs, working his way down to his stomach. “But there was something about you. From the first time I saw you in the ER. Something special.” 

Clint’s lips and tongue were drawing random patterns on Phil’s stomach, and he clenched his hands into tight fists, trying to keep himself under control. Clint’s words were driving him wild.

“You, too,” he said, as Clint nibbled at the skin over one hip-bone. “I wasn’t looking. I wasn’t even thinking about dating, but I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”

“I drove Nat crazy talking about you.” 

Phil could hear the grin in Clint’s voice, and then he gasped as he felt Clint’s hot wet tongue teasing the tip of his hard cock. “Oh, fuck, Clint, that’s so good.” Clint was tracing the crown of his cock with a very nimble tongue, and Phil fought the urge to thrust up into his mouth.

“Good,” Clint murmured. “Want to make you feel good, Phil. Want to rock your world.” Then he stopped talking, because he had Phil’s cock in his mouth and was expertly licking and sucking it.

Phil moaned. He writhed. He twisted the bed sheets in his clenched fists. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had sucked his cock. He liked giving head. Loved it. So he had a lot more experience giving than receiving. Which meant he appreciated how very good Clint was at it. So good, in fact, that in another minute, he was going to have to warn Clint off, because he was too close to coming. 

As it turned out, he didn’t have to because Clint released his cock with a filthy slurp and started licking his balls instead. 

“Fuck, fuck, Clint that’s… that’s…” Phil’s hips were moving without conscious thought, trying to push closer to the wonderful stimulation of Clint’s clever tongue. To Phil’s dismay, it moved away.

“Turn over for me,” Clint said, looking up at him from the bottom of the bed with a wicked grin. It took a moment for Phil’s lust-addled brain to process the instruction, but as soon as it did he scrambled to move, getting his knees under him and twisting his shoulders to flip onto his stomach. Clint’s hands were on his thighs, then his ass, grabbing and kneading with his long, strong fingers. 

“You’ve got a fantastic ass, Dr. Coulson,” Clint said as he continued to fondle it. Then he slid his hands down Phil’s thighs again, urging his knees a little wider apart. “Is that okay?”

“Yeah,” Phil said, folding his arms under his head and sinking down onto them. It felt lewd and vulnerable, having his ass in the air and his knees spread so wide that his balls were nearly brushing the sheets. It felt fantastic.

“You’re gorgeous like this,” Clint said and now his voice held reverence. He skimmed his hands up Phil’s back, and along his flanks. One hand skirted around to fondle Phil’s hard cock, making him moan again. Then Clint’s other hand was on his ass, pulling at one cheek to spread them, and… oh. 

Phil thought that Clint’s tongue on his cock and balls had been fantastic, but it was nothing compared to having it working the pucker of his ass. Phil relaxed his muscles with a sigh, and Clint’s tongue dipped inside. 

“Yeah, oh God, yeah. So good. So fucking good, Clint.”

Much as he hated to admit it, even to himself, Phil was a hungry, needy bottom. Having something (fingers, a dick, a toy, anything really) in his ass was his favorite part of any sexual encounter. Having someone rim him like this was heaven. He gasped and moaned. 

“Yeah, God, yeah. So good.” He couldn’t stop talking. “Fuck Clint, so fucking good.” Clint’s tongue pressed deeper and deeper and Phil thought he might come just from this, just from being given this much attention, but then the fantastic sensations stopped.

“You taste great,” Clint said, gasping for breath, “Makes me want to fuck you so bad.”

“Fuck me. Please Clint.” Phil hated himself for begging, but he couldn’t help it, now that his ass was empty. He needed it to be filled. “Please fuck me.”

“Yeah, babe, I’m gonna fuck you. Gonna make it so good. Let me just...”

Phil heard the click of the cap on the lube and felt fingers pressing against his hole. He sighed.

“Yeah, give it to me.”

“Don’t worry, I’m gonna give you everything you want. Just gonna make sure you’re good and slick first, gonna prep this sweet ass of yours for my cock.” Clint was fucking him with two fingers and Phil rocked his hips against them, trying to take them as deeply as he could. On the next stroke Clint’s fingers brushed his prostate and he saw stars.

“That good babe? You like it?” Clint asked, pressing in again and stroking the firm round gland.

“Love it. Fuck, Clint. Need you inside me. Need your cock.”

“My cock needs your ass. Just gimme a minute here.” 

Phil felt the fingers leaving his ass and managed not to whimper. He heard Clint tear open the condom packet and a soft swear. The things were such a pain with slick fingers. The lube cap snicked again, and then the bottle landed near his head. It felt like an age, but finally he could feel a warm blunt nudge at his hole, and Clint’s slippery hands grabbing his hips.

“This okay, babe?” 

“Perfect. It’s perfect, Clint. Want you so much.”

“You’ve got me. I’m right here. I’m… ahhhh.” Clint moaned as he started to sink into Phil’s ass. “Oh, fuck Phil, you feel so good. So fucking good. How does that feel, babe? Is it good?”

“It’s perfect,” Phil said. “Perfect.” 

“Good.” Clint had slowly pushed all the way in, but then stopped moving. “How do you like it? What can I do to make you feel good?”

“Feels incredible,” Phil said, wanting to reassure Clint while he tried to figure out how to answer the question. Because the truth was, he wanted whatever Clint liked. He wanted… he wanted Clint to use his body for his own pleasure, taking whatever he needed. “Fast or slow or hard or gentle, whatever works for you. I just… I… I like it when… “

“When what, Phil?” One of Clint’s hands left his hip and stroked his cock with slow gentle strokes.

“I like it when you’re having fun. When you’re getting what you need,” Phil said in a small voice.

“Okay, babe, in that case I’m gonna start real slow. ‘Cause you feel so good I wanna make it last.” And true to his word, Clint dragged his cock slowly back out of Phil’s ass and then pushed back in, just as slowly. Phil moaned.

“You like that?”

“I love it. Feels incredible.”

“Yeah, it sure does,” Clint said as he pulled out and pushed back in just as slowly. And then did it again, and again. “Wish you could see the view from here. You look so gorgeous, lying there all blissed out. You’re beautiful.” 

And before Phil could object or argue, Clint’s hand was on his cock again, matching the slow strokes and making him moan. 

“Yeah, that’s good babe. Let me hear you. I want to know that this is as good for you as it is for me.”

“It’s so good, Clint. So good. You fill me up so good.” Phil was far too turned on to be able to censor what was coming out of his mouth.

Clint kept up the same slow rhythm but started to put a little more power behind his thrusts, using his grip on Phil’s hip to slam their hips together.

“Fuck, yes.”

“Yeah? You like that? You like it hard? Tell me what you like, Phil. Tell me what you need.”

Clint’s words bounced around the inside of Phil's head, echoing to the slap of Clint’s groin against his ass. Phil was half out of his mind with arousal and need, and couldn’t stop himself from babbling out his answer.

“Need… need you to take me. Just fucking take me. Use me. Fuck me. Whatever you need, want you to take it. Please Clint, please.” Phil was almost sobbing with the combination of need and humiliation. He waited for Clint to stop, to pull out. To turn away in disgust.

Instead he felt hands on his chest, urging him to move.

“Come here. Can you get up, babe? Let me help you. That’s it, come up here.” Clint stopped thrusting as he urged Phil up onto his knees, his back pressed tightly against Clint’s chest, Clint’s cock still deep inside him.

“How’s that, is that okay?”

“Good. It’s good.” Phil said, because it was. They were kneeling upright on the bed and Clint was running his hands over Phil's skin.

“This is what I want,” Clint said, wrapping one powerful arm around Phil’s chest and holding him tightly. “Want your skin against mine. Want to feel as much of you as I can. Want to be able to touch you and kiss you. Yeah,” he said as Phil took the hint and turned his face. “That’s it babe, that’s perfect.” Clint started to thrust again with short but powerful strokes that made Phil feel like he was being split in two, and that Clint’s arm around his chest was all that was holding him together. It felt incredible, and he moaned. 

Clint’s tongue thrust into his mouth in the same rhythm as Clint’s cock in his ass. It was wonderful and perfect. Clint’s thrusts got harder, faster, sharper. He pulled his mouth away and gasped for air, then leaned his cheek against Phil’s.

“You close babe? I’m so close. You feel so good.”

“God, yes.”

“I want you to come. Tell me what you need so I can make you come.”

“Just… your hand,” and Phil gasped when Clint’s hand closed around his shaft almost immediately.

“Good. Tight, like this?”

“Real tight. Yeah.” Phil moaned as Clint tightened his fist, still slick with lube, and stroked him.

“Like that? You gonna come for me?”

“God. Fuck. Yes.” Phil strained against Clint’s arm around his chest, strained against Clint fist around his dick, strained around Clint’s cock filling his ass, every muscle taut as his orgasm built from a ball of fire in his groin and then crackled out along every single nerve ending in a explosive, glorious release. Phil was pretty sure he had screamed, and he hoped he hadn’t damaged Clint’s hearing aids. 

Clint was still holding him tight, still thrusting hard and sharp though his rhythm had disintegrated to a series of short frantic jabs. 

“Yeah,” Clint was saying. “Yeah, yeah, yeah, oh yeah.” The last syllable was a soft sigh on a long exhale and Clint’s chin dropped onto Phil’s shoulder. “God. That was amazing. You good?”

“Fantastic,” Phil said, turning his head to search for Clint’s lips, and wondering what happened now. Should he offer to leave? Was that what people did?

Clint was kissing him lazily, a sticky hand still curled protectively around his softening dick, the arm around his chest looser, but still holding him close.

“I hope you’re a cuddler,” Clint said with a soft, almost dopey smile between kisses.

“Yes, I uh… yes,” Phil said helplessly.

“Good. Gonna move now, and get cleaned up, then we’ll climb under the covers, okay?”

“Sounds wonderful,” Phil said, and he meant it.


	10. Chapter 10

Clint had shown Phil the bathroom facilities, given him a washcloth and a towel, and told him to use the shower if he wanted to. 

“I’m gonna be in bed, sorry, but great sex always kinda knocks me out,” he said, feeling a little sheepish. But what else was he going to do, stand around buck-ass naked, waiting for Phil to finish in the bathroom? That would be creepy. So he set the locks and the alarms, switched his phone to silent, and put his clothes in the hamper, and Phil’s on a spare chair, then climbed into bed.

It only took a couple of minutes after that for Phil to emerge from the bathroom, looking a little shy.

“Come here.” Clint beckoned Phil towards the bed, turning down the sheets invitingly on the other side. Phil gave him a small smile, and climbed in. Clint grabbed his arm and pulled and prodded Phil into snuggling against his chest. “Is that okay? Are you comfortable?”

“Yes. I’m fine.”

But Clint could tell that there was something wrong. Phil wasn’t nearly as relaxed as he had been earlier. “What’s up? Did I hurt you?”

“No, no of course not. I’m fine. It’s fine.”

“Then why do I get the idea that something’s bothering you? Would you rather not stay?” Clint asked quietly.

“No. That is, I’d love to stay. I… I’m sorry.”

“What for?” Clint couldn’t think of anything Phil should be apologizing for.

“For, ah, earlier. When you were… when you asked me how I liked it. I got a little bit too… submissive.”

Clint wasn’t sure what Phil meant, but whatever it was, it was obviously bothering him, so Clint stroked his shoulder soothingly. “I didn’t mind at all, if that’s what you’re worried about. I asked you what you wanted, because I wanted to know. Because I wanted to give it to you, if I could. Did you like it, what we did?”

“I loved it.”

“Then what’s the problem?” Clint asked gently, softly.

“I…” Phil made a frustrated sound. “I’m sorry. Grant hated it. So I guess I just assumed that you… that other people would too. He said it made me too… feminine.”

Clint couldn’t help himself. He laughed. “This would be the same Grant who is currently engaged to a woman?”

“Hey, bisexual people often look for different qualities in men than in women.” Phil lifted his head off Clint’s shoulder and gave him a sharp look.

“I know. Believe me, I know. I’m sorry. It just… Look, Phil, I don’t think being submissive in bed makes you feminine. I think it makes you someone who likes to be submissive in bed. And I have no problem with anything we did tonight. I liked it very much. Now, if there’s other stuff you like that you want to tell me about, we can talk about that.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, like if you’re into any of that BDSM stuff. I don’t have a lot of experience, but I’m not at all freaked out by it, so - “

“No. Christ no. Not that there’s anything wrong with it,” Phil said quickly. “It’s just… not me. Not at all. I just…” Phil sighed.

“It’s okay. You don’t have to explain right now. Or at all.”

“I want to. I want to try. It’s not like the BDSM stuff, it’s… It’s just that… I’m a doctor. People. Patients, some of them, they treat you like you’re God, sometimes. And you make decisions - you know this, you do it in the field - what drugs to give, your best guess on what’s wrong, how to treat it. And if it goes wrong it’s on you. On your conscience. It’s… a lot. Every day.”

“Yeah, yeah I know what you mean." Clint said, tightening his arms around Phil. "I had a hard time with that, at first. But I guess it’s easier for us, ‘cause we always get to hand the patients off to you. I mean even if they’re flat-lined, and we know there’s no hope, we still wheel them into an ER, and you guys go through the motions, just in case, it… it makes it so that it’s not all on us, you know?”

“Yes. And it is on me. Because I’m the doctor. Don’t get me wrong, I love it, it’s just… Some days I understand why so many doctors end up on booze, or pills. So… so I, uh, kind of…” Phil fell silent, and blushed.

“Want someone else to be in control in bed,” Clint said.

“Yes. Sometimes I just want to let go and just… take it. I’m sorry, that doesn’t sound fair at all.”

“It’s not about fair. It’s about what makes us both happy.”

Phil was quiet for a minute and then asked, “What makes you happy?”

Clint kissed his forehead and hooked one ankle over Phil’s calf, tangling their legs together. He squeezed the arm that was around Phil’s back and stroked Phil’s shoulder with his free hand.

“This,” he said. “Touching. Cuddling. Skin-on-skin. I, uh… I told you about being raised in foster homes?”

“Yes.”

“So after I was like, eight years old, I didn’t get held, or cuddled, or touched very much at all. I mean there were a couple of foster moms who were great, they’d let me sit next to them on the couch to watch TV and I could cuddle a little, but most of the time… most of the time there were five other kids, half of them younger than me, all wanting attention, and… well, anyway, I ended up kinda touch deprived. So having this…” Clint’s throat closed up on him, and he stopped talking. Phil kissed the patch of skin that was under his lips, and wrapped his free hand around Clint’s shoulder, tracing the prominent collarbone with his thumb.

“I like this,” Phil said. “I like it a lot.” 

“Good. Stay the night? I’d really love to wake up next to you tomorrow morning.”

“I’d like that,” Phil said, and he finally seemed to relax completely in Clint’s arms. 

“Do you need me to set an alarm or something? Are you working?” Clint asked.

“Night shift tomorrow.”

“Ugh, that sucks.”

“Yes. I’ll try to get a couple hours nap tomorrow afternoon before I go in,” Phil said then snuggled further into Clint's embrace.

Clint nodded, and kissed him again. “You comfortable enough like this? ‘Cause I’m gonna drop off pretty soon. A long day and a great orgasm always knocks me out.”

“Do you usually sleep with your hearing aids in?”

“Oh. No, not usually, but if I take them out, you’ll have to shout at me in the morning.”

“I don’t mind. I’ve been meaning to ask,” Phil said, as Clint shifted to sit up in bed. “Do you sign at all?”

“A little,” Clint said, putting one of his aids down on the bedside table, and then holding his thumb and forefinger an inch apart using what was both the ASL and pretty much universal sign. “I’m taking classes at the VA, in case I lose more of my hearing. It’s tough with my work schedule though, I miss so much. Why do you ask?”

Phil haltingly brought his fingertips up to his forehead and then cycled both index fingers in front of his chest. “I know how to sign a little,” he said. “I took ASL as an elective when I was in pre-med, figuring that it would come in handy for communicating with deaf patients.” Then he blushed a little. “After I met you I, uh, pulled my old books out to see how much I remembered, just in case, you, uh…”

Clint could feel the silly grin spreading across his face. “That’s great,” he said, seeing from Phil expression that his voice was a little too loud, now that he had his hearing aids out. He tried to tone it down a little. “We could practice together, and that way I’ll do better in my classes.”

“That would be fun,” Phil said, speaking up, and signing ‘fun’.

“Ready to get some sleep now, though?” Clint asked. He was really wiped.

“Yes.” Phil smiled and moved into his arms without prompting this time. Clint wrapped both his arms around Phil and sighed contentedly. 

“Good night,” he whispered and kissed Phil’s forehead. Phil just nuzzled his neck and squeezed his arm once, briefly, before relaxing.

~~~~~~

Clint woke up warm and comfortable and happy. He was still lying on his back, but Phil had shifted in the night and was curled up on his side, facing away, but with his back pressed close up against Clint’s flank. Clint smiled. Bobbi had hated sleeping cuddled up with him. She complained that he pinned her down and made her too hot. She had wanted him to move into her place, with her king-sized bed so that she didn’t have to be anywhere near him at night. They'd gotten married spur-of-the-moment, on a whim, and their mutual inability to work out the details of how and where to live together had been the beginning of the end of their relationship.

The fact that Phil was pressed up against him in his sleep made Clint feel wanted in a way that he never had with Bobbi. There had been other things about their relationship that had been great, fantastic even, but she hadn’t been physically affectionate in the way Clint needed. 

And with her, he hadn’t been able to talk about it, to explain it the way he had to Phil last night. Maybe because Phil had his own issues and insecurities, maybe that had made the difference, but it seemed easy and safe to tell Phil that he wanted to cuddle, that he needed to hold and be held. Bobbi had been so self-assured, so autonomous. Her strength had been what attracted him, at first, but it was a strength that didn’t bend, or at least couldn’t bend as much as Clint needed for them to fit together.

He and Phil, somehow, seemed to fit. Clint rolled onto his side, spooning behind Phil and was rewarded with an unconscious shift as Phil pressed himself further into Clint’s warmth. Clint put his arm around Phil’s chest, sliding his fingers into the coarse fuzz and smiled contentedly. He tucked his nose into the crook of Phil’s neck, taking a deep inhale of his warm skin. 

“Morning,” Phil mumbled. Or that was what Clint assumed he had said.

“Sorry, did I wake you?” he asked, trying not to pitch his voice too loudly, since his lips were near Phil’s ear.

“No,” Phil said loudly enough for Clint to hear him clearly. 

“Are you okay? No regrets, no second thoughts?” Clint had to ask. Before he let himself sink into the wonderful feeling of having this man in his bed, in his life, he needed to know that he wasn’t going to be hurt again.

“No. Absolutely not.” Phil laid his arm on top of Clint’s, pinning it to his chest. Clint took the hint and kissed Phil’s shoulder. He could feel Phil’s contented sigh. “I missed this. Missed it so much.”

“Me too. Uh, my ex, Bobbi, she hated snuggling like this. Said I made her too hot.”

Phil chuckled. 

“What?” 

“You make me hot, but I’m not complaining.” Phil said, turning his head so that Clint could hear him better. He laced his fingers through Clint’s and slid their joined hands down until they encountered a hot, hard dick.

Clint laughed and twisted his neck so that his could kiss Phil on the lips. “Is that a suggestion, Dr. Coulson?”

“Only if you want it to be, Mr. Barton.”

“Let me put my hearing aids in so you don’t have to shout. Go use the washroom if you want.” 

Phil’s grin was wry. “I got up in the middle of the night, thanks to my 51-year-old bladder.”

“No way you’re that old!”

“Would you like to see my driver’s license?” Phil’s smile was nervous.

“No… I just didn’t think… I figured you were in your mid-to-late 40s, that’s all. I’m 39, by the way.”

“Is my age an issue, Clint?” Phil said it carefully, as if he was steeling himself for rejection, and Clint hated himself for making Phil feel that way.

“No. Fuck no. No issue. Totally not. I don’t care how old you are. You just don’t look 51, that’s all. Come here.” Clint had finished plugging his hearing aids into his ears and he reached for Phil, pulling him close and kissing him. “I like you and I want you and I think you’re sexy and I don’t give a fuck how old you are.” He murmured between kisses. He was reveling in the fact that Phil’s hands were all over him, skimming his chest and his arms and his back, teasing his nipples and kneading the thick muscles of his shoulders. It made Clint feel appreciated, wanted, and he loved it.

He wrapped his arms around Phil, eased him back down to the mattress, and kissed him until everything was good again. Nothing mattered except the feel of warm skin on warm skin, of two hard cocks bumping and rubbing, of tongues delving and tasting, of hands exploring. Clint loved the little noises Phil kept making, the soft gasps and moans and sighs. He loved knowing that he was giving pleasure, and Phil seemed to soak it up like a sponge. 

Clint blanketed Phil’s body with his own, straddling Phil and resting much of his weight on his knees and elbows, but letting Phil take some of it, pinning him down against the mattress. He slid one strong arm under Phil’s shoulders and Phil wrapped his own arms around Clint’s back, pulling him down even more.

“You like that?” Clint asked. He didn’t really need to ask, but he wanted to hear Phil say it. He wanted to hear Phil’s breathless voice, because it sounded so damn sexy.

“I love it. Love having you on top of me. Feels so good.”

“Yes it does,” Clint said, and he nibbled kisses down Phil’s neck. 

“You can… Last night, you said it was okay if I left marks. Same, oh God, Clint.” Phil seemed to lose his train of thought for a moment as Clint started to rock against him, not hard or fast enough to make either of them come, but enough to feel amazing. “You can too, if you want. Just, oh, fuck that feels good. Just try to stay below the collar, please.” 

Clint loved that he was making Phil gasp and moan and lose his words in the middle of a sentence. He was rocking slowly, providing a delicious teasing stimulation for two cock trapped between their taut bellies, and he was licking and sucking and nipping at a sensitive spot he’d found in the hollow of Phil’s throat.

“There… is… fine,” Phil gasped, and slid one of his hands down to Clint’s ass, grabbing it and thrusting up as much as he could despite being pinned under Clint’s weight. Phil’s moans grew louder and his breathing ragged as Clint sucked a hickey into his skin. 

“There,” Clint said when he finally pulled away to admire the livid bruise he’d made. “Now you’re all mine.”

“Already was,” Phil said, his eyes serious. Clint wanted to make a joke, but the words stuck in his throat. Phil looked so vulnerable, and so sincere, and Clint realized he was falling in love. He leaned down and kissed Phil before he could do something stupid like say it out loud. The kiss was hot and wet and deep. He plundered Phil’s mouth, taking control since he now knew Phil liked that, and rubbing against him a little harder, and a little faster. 

When he finally pulled away for breath, Phil gasped “Please.”

“Please what, Phil? What do you want?”

“Please fuck me. Want you inside me. Please.”

Clint smiled. “Good. Like this?” he asked.

Phil looked confused.

“Face-to-face, I mean. Do you like it like that?”

“Yes,” Phil said, but it was a hoarse whisper.

“Phil? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Phil’s voice broke on the word and he cleared his throat. “Nothing, I just. I would like that very, very much. I haven’t… Grant didn’t like it, so we never…”

Clint leaned down and kissed him again, once, softly. “Okay, I know I brought it up first this time, but from now on I think we need to have a ban on talking about our exes in bed.” 

Phil smiled a small, sad smile up at him. “That is a very good idea.”

Clint moved to the side, and Phil tightened his grip on Clint's arm.

“I’m not going far, I promise,” Clint said, sliding off and reaching for the nightstand drawer. He dropped the supplies within reach on the bed, and then urged Phil to roll up onto his side, facing him. “There we go, that’s it,” he said as he arranged Phil’s limbs so that one arm was around Clint’s back and one knee was drawn up, snug between Clint’s legs. “How’s that?” he asked, reaching down to Phil’s ass and sliding one finger between his cheeks. Phil sighed.

“Perfect, just perfect,” Phil said, snuggling closer and relaxing. Clint dipped his head and kissed the bruise he’d made earlier. Phil shivered. 

“Gonna make you feel so good, Phil. Gonna bury myself deep inside you and fill you up.”

“Yeah, want you to fill me up. Love having your cock in me.”

“Soon babe,” Clint said, reaching for the lube and squeezing some into his hand. “Gotta get you all slick and ready first. How’s that?” he asked slowly sliding two fingers into Phil’s hole. “Is that good?”

“Yeah, so good. So fucking good Clint, I can’t tell you.”

“That’s it, babe,” Clint said. “Just relax and take it. You take it so good for me.” Clint had slid a third finger in and was working them deep into Phil’s ass, nudging his prostate on every thrust. 

“God. Fuck. Yes. Clint, fuck.” Phil was clinging to him now, his hand on Clint’s back gripping the thick muscles tightly, and rocking his hips in counterpoint to Clint’s probing fingers. Clint didn’t know if Phil was trying to get friction on his dick, or fuck himself on Clint’s fingers or both. It didn’t really matter, just seeing Phil panting and desperate like this was incredibly erotic, and Clint needed to sheath himself in Phil’s body as soon as possible. 

Clint stilled his fingers. “Want to fuck you now, babe.”

“Yes. Oh, God yes.” 

“Good, just give me a sec here.” Clint slid his fingers out of Phil’s ass, rolled onto his back, and fumbled with the condom packet. 

“Uh, I could, if you wanted,” Phil said, indicating the packet that Clint was trying to tear open with slick fingers.”

“That’d be awesome, thanks.” 

Phil smiled and took the foil square from him, deftly tearing it open. “Do you want me to…?” 

“Sure, go for it.”

Phil carefully rolled the condom on and then looked away shyly. 

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Clint asked, his hard-on wilting a little with his worry.

“Nothing. Nothing, really it’s just… This, you… You’re so good to me. It means a lot to me.”

Clint kissed him, then straddled him, looking down into the depths of Phil’s bright blue eyes and seeing so much pain and uncertainty. Without ever having met the man, he hated Phil's ex for having it put it there. “You mean a lot to me, Phil.” Clint dipped his head and kissed Phil deeply, and a little desperately. Phil kissed back just as desperately, as if he couldn’t help himself. Then Phil was wrapping his legs around Clint’s back, and pulling his mouth away to ask, “Please.”

“Yeah,” Clint said, shifting into position and getting one hand between them to ease himself in. Phil moaned at the first tiny nudge at his hole. “I’m here,” Clint soothed, kissing him again and again. “I’ve got you, I’m here,” he murmured and he slid slowly in. 

Time seemed to stop for Clint, suspended in the depths of Phil’s eyes, which were wide and bright and still a little sad, staring into his with such longing. Clint wanted nothing more than to spend the rest of his life filling those depths and taking away all remaining traces of sadness. They were both quiet, this time, Clint stroking in and out slowly, sensuously, wanting to give Phil everything he could. Phil held him tightly, both arms and both legs wrapped around him as if he wanted to meld their bodies together. Clint had no objections to him trying. 

Their need built slowly. Gradually Clint’s thrusts became a little stronger, a little faster, a little more powerful. Phil started to make small sounds with each thrust, first just a gentle exhale, then a quiet moan. Clint was getting closer. He kissed Phil, then asked, “Can you come just from this?”

“Yes, if…”

“If what? Tell me Phil, please. Anything, anything you need.”

“Talk to me… tell me it’s good for you.”

“Oh, fuck, babe, it’s so good. It’s so fucking good I don’t have words. You feel incredible. I love the way you’re wrapped around me, trying to get as close as you can. I love how your skin feels against mine. You’re so hot and tight around me, babe, it’s amazing. It’s fucking incredible. I’m so close. So close babe, all for you.” Clint pounded fast and hard as he gasped out his words, still staring into Phil’s face.

Phil jerked under him and his eyes squeezed shut. “I’m coming Clint. I’m coming on your cock.”

“Yeah. Take it. Take my cock. So good, Phil. So fucking… ahhh.” Clint managed to hold himself up until they’d both finished spasming, and then he collapsed on top of Phil. 

“Fuck that was awesome,” he said in Phil’s ear. Phil was panting for breath under him.

“Yeah,” Phil agreed, “yeah.”

Clint couldn’t help but chuckle.

“What’s funny?”

“Most people in my life want me to shut up. No one’s ever actually asked me to run at the mouth before. And hey - don’t you dare get embarrassed about that,” Clint said, turning his head to kiss the tip of Phil’s ear, which was already starting to blush. “Because I fucking loved it.”

“Well, that’s okay then,” Phil said, and they both dissolved in giggles.


	11. Epilogue

“I think it’s under the sofa.”

“How the hell did it end up there?”

“How should I know. I keep telling you this animal has superpowers.”

“I’m just going to get a new one from the bottle.”

“Don’t you dare. She goes batshit when she hears the bottle open, and I’ve just managed to keep her still. Grab it and get over here.”

“Found it!” Phil said from his hands and knees next to the sofa, triumphantly holding a lint-covered tablet aloft.

“Good. Great. Now get over here and give it to her before I lose my grip.” 

Phil walked over to where Clint had a struggling, spitting cat in his arms.

“Now, Captain Whiskers, who's a sweet pussy cat going to take her pill properly this time like a good girl,” Phil said in a sing-song voice.

“You don’t need to sweet talk her, Phil, you just need to pry her jaw open and shove it down her throat.”

“I don’t want to traumatize her.”

“Yes, and I don’t want to need stitches again, so could you please just get it over with.” 

“Okay,” Phil said to Clint and, “Who’s a good kitty?” to the struggling cat in his arms. Then Phil finally became business like, and set about prying the cat’s jaws open and shoving the pill down her gullet.

“Hold her mouth closed! Hold it closed until she swallows, otherwise…” Clint sounded frantic.

“I know, I know,” Phil said, clamping three fingers around the cat’s nose and chin. “I just hate the look of betrayal she gives me when I do that.”

“Yeah, well if you don’t, you get to hold her while I get the pill out from under the sofa.”

“I’m doing it. I’m doing it.” Phil said, as he stroked a finger down the cat’s throat, encouraging her to swallow. He sighed. “I wish there was some way of explaining to her that it’s for her own good.”

“Weren’t you telling me, just the other day, about a patient who refused to take his meds, even though you had patiently explained why he should every week for six weeks in a row?”

“Yes, what does that have to do with anything?”

“Isn’t this better than if she did understand, and then still refused to take her pills?”

“You have a point. Do you think it’s been long enough?”

“Give it another minute. That way at least if she hasn’t swallowed it, enough will have dissolved in her mouth that it’ll have some effect, anyway. Oh, and it’s your turn to clean the litter box.”

“It is not! I did it yesterday.”

“You did it Tuesday.”

“Tuesday was yesterday.”

“I hate to break this to you babe, but today’s Thursday.”

“Shit.”

“Yep.”

“God, I swear night shifts didn’t screw me up this much when I was younger.”

“They did, you just didn’t notice because of all the wild parties.”

“Yeah, right. I’m going to let go now.”

“Okay.” 

Phil unclamped his hand from around the cat’s muzzle, and stepped back. Clint leaned down and deposited her on the floor. She bolted for the far corner of the loft.

“She hates us.”

“She’ll be back in five minutes, demanding scritches. Which you can give her while I make breakfast.”

Phil wrapped his arms around Clint. “How’d I get so lucky as to end up with a boyfriend who can cook, anyway?”

“When your standards for edible food run from MREs to hospital cafeterias. Besides, it’s not all that hard to figure out how to make pancakes from a mix.”

“You spoil me.”

“Because I love you. And your demented cat.” Clint was whisking pancake mix and milk in a bowl, and a frying pan was heating on the stove. Phil had his arms around Clint and was pressed up against his back, knowing from experience that he was safe until Clint started wielding a spatula.

“Our demented cat. You came with me to the shelter to pick her out, that makes her our cat.”

“Yeah, you said, ‘When I move in with you, can I bring a cat?’ and I said, ‘What cat?’ and you said ‘The one I was planning to adopt when I was going to be a sad lonely single old gay man with a cat.’”

“Aw, come on, you fell in love with Captain Whiskers the minute you saw her, admit it.” Clint had poured four rounds of batter into the pan, so Phil moved aside and leaned against the kitchen counter.

“Phil, you took me to a cat shelter. A place full of homeless animals that desperately needed homes. Like I was going to say ‘No, we can’t bring the one you have your heart set on home’. It’s a damn good thing they only had cats, or we’d’ve ended up with a one-eyed dog named ‘Lucky’ as well.” Clint expertly flipped a cooked pancake onto a plate. On cue, Captain Whiskers jumped up onto the counter and started to drag it away.

“I swear she’s psychic. The minute the first pancake is cooked, she tries to steal it.” Clint swatted at the cat with the spatula, missing on purpose.

“She probably can tell it’s done by the smell or something. Let her have it. It’s our penance for making her take her medicine,” Phil said, picking up both the cat and the plate with the pancake and putting them both on the floor. He got a new one from the cupboard and put it on the counter next to the stove. 

Clint cooked pancakes until there was a tall stack on the plate. Phil watched for a bit, then set the table with plates, silverware, glasses of juice, and a jug of syrup. Clint came over with the plate of pancakes and put it in the middle of the table. 

“Ready to eat?” he asked.

“Just about. One thing I want to do first,” Phil said with a twinkle in his eye.

“What’s that?”

“This,” Phil said, and pulled him into a tight hug and kissed him.

“Not that I’m objecting,” Clint said when they parted, “but what was that for?”

“Happy anniversary,” Phil said.

“Which one?” asked Clint. It was a fair question. The start of their relationship had been… unconventional, and to this day they disagreed about when they’d actually gotten together.

“First time you teased me about how much syrup I like on my pancakes,” Phil said, sitting down at the table and pouring the syrup liberally over his plate. “Also, a year ago today I asked you out, and you said yes.”

“That was a good idea, both the you asking me out, and the me saying yes,” Clint said, grinning at Phil across the breakfast table.

“Yeah, it was.” Phil’s eyes were shining.

“Happy anniversary.” So were Clint’s.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much to Ereshai for the beta and MissBlackCrow and Raiining for the technical medical info!
> 
> Find me on Tumblr at: [Jo Mathieson](http://jmathieson-fic.tumblr.com/)


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